Presenting... Our Pilot

Our Premiere!

The pilot episode of Ultra Clean is going to premiere on YouTube on Thursday the 10th of January!

It's been a long road to get here, and at the same time it's all happened very quickly.  It's hard to believe we've fit so much into just a few short months.  But we've come up with a pilot we're very proud of and that we hope will attract the attention of viewers and sponsors alike.

Ultra Clean now has a YouTube channel at youtube.com/ultracleantv, so go over and check it out.  That's where the pilot will be premiering, and it's where we're currently running an Ultra Clean promo.  Watch the promo 17 times - it gets better and better!

Final Edit!

We have now officially signed off on the final edit of our pilot! Well, except for the music, that is. We still need to put music on the show. And maybe we'll tinker just a little bit with the sound. And there's maybe one or two cuts that could be tightened a bit. But essentially we're completely and finally signed off.

Here's wishing everyone out there a fantastic holiday season from the whole Ultra Clean team. Stay tuned at the beginning of January, because 2013 is going to be the year of Ultra Clean!

After the shoot...

We shot our pilot last Saturday and it went great! It was a thrill for me to see this brilliant cast and crew come together and put all their talent into some silly words I wrote.

Now it's time to edit, which is going to take a while but will be tonnes of fun. Hours upon hours of fun in a tiny, enclosed space, watching the same moments over and over again until they lose all meaning. As I say, fun!

We'll keep you up to date on the blog and on the Ultra Clean Facebook page. Come for the coffee, stay for the intensity! (I don't know what that means.)

Show Week

It's show week!  We shoot this week!  Everything we've done so far has been leading up to this moment.  This is the week the script, the actors and the vision of the director come together.  We're going going to capture our pilot episode, and thus the essence of our show this week.  And I'm beyond excited about it.  I'm shrieking like a marmoset about it.

This is a marmoset:

Wait, that's a marmoset?  Seriously?  Do those things even shriek?  Then what the hell am I doing?!

Regardless of all that, I'm a happy fella this week.  A happy, busy fella.  We've been running around locking down costume, props, locations and making sure the script delivery is smooth as silk.  It's nuts and it's going to get nuts-er.  But I wouldn't have it any other way.

Hooray for the industrial revolution, which step-by-step led to this moment in time, effectively making all of this possible!

A Writing Meeting

We had a writing meeting last night. Normally a writing meeting for a comedy show means sitting in a sweaty room with a bunch of men, drinking in the odours of jam doughnuts and feet. But ours was a much more civilised affair.

Joining me, the head writer, were actor James Chapman, series director John Wood and friend of the series Sally Davies. See? We're already better than most comedy shows because we have a woman writing with us. We'll probably be pulling in some more writers as the series progresses, but our little group of four was perfect for a start.

L to R: James Chapman, Tristram Baumber, Sally Davies (John Wood taking the picture with his hands)

Together, we started tossing episode ideas around, as well as little scraps of ideas that couldn't possibly make a whole episode but were nonetheless trapped in our brains and had to see the light of day otherwise our heads would explode. Ideas of that type were mainly mine.

We're planning on writing 12 episodes, so now is the time to lay out the plans for what each of those episodes will be. Lots of ideas were suggested, although sadly no episodes about robots. I like TV shows about robots. As well as individual stories, we were also planning out some long-term story arcs. These are the stories that take place over whole seasons, or even complete runs of a show. For example, on a TV show about robots, the writers would plan out everything that was going to happen to the robots as the show progressed, episode by episode. Or on Lost, the writers wouldn't plan anything, they'd just pretend to.

On our show there are several stories that are going to continue episode to episode. It's our way of making the show a bit "soapy" and getting people to tune in each week. I'll talk about this more in our next blog but right now a giant robot that claims to be my secret brother-in-law is taking me and my whole family to court, risking our fortune, and I have to open this envelope containing my important medical test results.

(See what I did there?)

What's that? I'm in a Web Series? Okay cool!

I've heard that the best way to tell a story is to start at the end briefly, then to go back to the beginning and work your way back to the end, giving a chance for different characters to show their perspectives. However, I don't have time for that. I have funerals to go to (Horrible skiing accident, don't ask) So I'll make this as brief as I can.

As actors, its easy to become naturally pessimistic. It happens and it's perfectly normal. It's just how we cope with working in a very competitive business. Being told that you're not right for a role because you look to young, or your nose is the wrong shape, or crotch-less jeans are inappropriate attire for an audition-- well, it helps give you a thick skin. As well as this, we've all been involved in projects that have fallen through. Film projects are notorious for this. That's why we try and avoid getting over excited when fun jobs come up. However, containing my excitement when Trit told me about Ultra Clean proved to be impossible.

A few months ago I was involved in a show with the other cast members called The Playwright's Dozen. Unbeknownst to us, Tristram came and saw it. He must have liked what he saw because a few days later, he added me on Facebook and told me that he really enjoyed the play I wrote "Ones and Zeros". I put the enjoyment factor of that play on the performances of Ollie Brylynsky and Jack Gow rather than my writing but what evs.

Anyway, about a month ago, we were told that a comedy Web Series called Ultra Clean had been written and we were being considered for roles. "Hell to the yes!" I yelled out loud as fellow bus passengers looked at me with what I can only describe as a combination of disgust and annoyance. After I got kicked off the bus, I read the synopsis. It was really something else. Exactly my kind of humour which is both amazing and kind of creepy. The characters are so well written and the dynamics between the four Ultra Clean members is really going to drive this show along. Ollie, Tina and Tara are all amazing actors and their involvement guaranteeing that this will be an amazing show to work on.

In just over a month, we've met three times, had table reads, rehearsals, production photos taken, found a production company and set up locations for shooting a pilot. This is going to be a rollercoaster ride, so keep your arms and legs in the cart at all times and if you vomit all over yourself, well...I know a good team of cleaners who can help fix that right up.

Thankyou for sitting through what is sure to be the worst written and least funny of all the posts on this blog. Let me reward you with a picture of a happy puppy!

What? That's what happiness looks like, right?

Right!?