The People Behind the Making of The Birth of The Akumal Comedy Festival the Interview: Producer Dan Schlissel

Dan Schlissel is no stranger to building things from the ground up. As the owner and founder of Stand Up! Records, he has taken what was originally an offer to record a CD for Lewis Black into a Grammy Award winning venture with 87 records released from dozens of comedians including Marc Maron, Doug Stanhope and Maria Bamford. 12 years into the game, Stand Up! has become the watermark for good independent comedy. In 2010, Dan was on vacation in Akumal with several friends including comedian (and festival co-founder) Gus Lynch. When Dan approached Gus with the idea of a comedy Festival in Akumal, it was safe to say that Dan would put 100% into building this festival from the ground up. Youngnotions.com talks to Dan about his history in Comedy, what it takes to start a comedy festival and what lies ahead.


Photo by Nick Vlcek




Bill: You’ve travelled all around the country to record comedians for your label. Is this the first time your job has taken you out of the US?

Dan: No, this isn’t the first time I have recorded outside America. In October of 2010, I went to Vancouver, British Columbia (Canada) to record audio for a Darryl Lenox CD/DVD project. In March 2011, I went to Glasgow, Scotland to record Danny Lobell. It’s not easy to cross borders to record, but I’ve done it. This is the first time I’ve taken on a project with this many moving parts, though.

Bill: So it’s safe to say that with all the travelling you’ve done, you’ve eaten a lot of airport food. Remember that steak sandwich you had at the Guacamole Grille in the Cancun airport?

Dan: Well, it was technically a beef milanesa (breaded steak) sandwich. I mention this because they had chicken milanesa as well, but I opted for the beef. It was three four-inch segments of really great sandwich on super fresh bread. I have to say, if you are in Cancun Airport, terminal three, go to Guacamole Grill. As far as airport food goes, it really doesn’t get any better. It seems odd that we’re starting this on one of the last things we did together as a group. Aren’t you going to ask about the rest of the trip?

Bill:Don’t worry. I’m just trying to paint a picture for the audience to see what the whole festival experience is like. Wasn’t that sandwich huge?

Dan: It was three sections long! The milanesa was thick, but tender. The bread was the picture of a perfect french loaf. It was spectacular for regular food, but for airport food, it was seriously off the chart. Wait… This has nothing to do with getting you all down there and back, let alone the shows or the fundraising.

Bill: Don’t worry. I’ll edit this stuff down to the only the most interesting parts. We’ll get to that other stuff later. Normally airports usually have such shitty food but this sandwich was amazing! We’re talking food court, too. This wasn’t like an airport Applebee’s or Margaritaville. I guess my question here is don’t you hate Jimmy Buffett?

Dan:Well, there was a Margaritaville at this airport as well. (Darlene) Westgor needed to hit that, of course. God forbid she skip an opportunity to drink… Anyway, I don’t get it. I won’t give that asshole that’s ruined so many paradise locations or his “peckerhead” fans a dime to ruin my time in any tropical spot, or airport food court for that matter, that’s for damned sure. The less money they take in, the sooner they go away is my theory.

(Editor’s note: The views of Sand Up! Records on Jimmy Buffett completely reflect those of youngnotions.com. Jimmy Buffett is a piece of shit and his music is awful. He needs to put the guitar and bong he carved out of driftwood down and leave everybody alone.)

Bill: I die a little every time I hear Margaritaville at a karaoke bar. Okay. That’s all the time we have! Great interview.

Dan: Are you fucking kidding me?!? I took eighteen comedians, a film crew, a sound crew, a writer for the City Pages and a programmer for 24/7 Comedy Radio to *ANOTHER COUNTRY*, for the first ever comedy festival to be put on there and you’re not going to say shit about it? I am going to fucking murder you when I see you next!

Bill: Don’t worry, I’ll shoehorn all that stuff in before I post the interview.


For more information on Jimmy Buffett, ask someone with horrible taste in music.

The Best and Worst of the Akumal Comedy Festival.

Best: Sol Beer.


Sol!




I had never seen Sol beer before going to Mexico. I don’t know if it’s not available in the US or you just can’t find it in the midwest but I soon got to know Sol beer very intimately. I didn’t drink much beer the first few days as beer gives me troubled trousers these days so I mainly stuck to a drink I invented called “Pool Rum”. Here’s how you make a Pool Rum.



1. Grab a bottle of rum.
2. Drink it in a pool.



As the week went on I got a little more courageous with the beer and by the end of the week I was pounding Sol pretty hard with no gut troubles. I’m no scientist but I think that this means that Sol is a tasty magic Mexican beer and they don’t carry it around here because the government is afraid people will learn of it’s healing properties.


Worst: FUD Hot Dogs



FUD





On the third night I picked up some brats, hot dogs and buns for some late night drinkey snacks. We ended up moving to a different rental house the next day and while I remembered to bring the hod dogs and brats, I forgot the buns. That night we were getting into the Sol and pool rum and wanted something to eat but the only food was the brats and dogs. The brats were Johnsonville, a brand that’s everywhere in the states so we knew what we were getting. The dogs were FUD brand.



According to Wikipedia, FUD (pronounced “food”) is an acronym for the Spanish words Fino, Unico y Delicioso (Refined, Unique & Delicious). Looking at it through american eyes you just end up saying “Food” and really over pronouncing the “u” like it’s something you’d find at Ikea. Whatever. It’s pretty hard to fuck up a hot dog, right? We put them in a pan and threw water in to simmer. Festival Comedian and friend Nate Abshire manned the pan while the rest of us got back to drinking.



After a few minutes I looked over to the pan and the hot dogs had swelled to literally three times their size. Their smooth texture had been replaced by a wrinkly one. I asked Nate to describe what it looked like this morning on facebook chat and here’s what he gave me.



“They looked like an uncircumcised penis, riddled with leprosy, slowly becoming engorged with malignant desire.” He’s not wrong.



When they were taken out of the water and off the heat they shrank back down to roughly their original size but the wrinkles and cuts from their hulk out remained. Now they were just withered little things that we had no choice but to eat because we had the drunken munchies and you don’t want to waste food (there’s starving Children in America). They tasted like wet pencil erasers. No amount of hot sauce made them palatable.



The wikipedia article for FUD states that they just struck a deal with a US company to license and distribute the wrinkledick dogs up here. Consider yourself warned.

Stupid Mexico is For Jerks.

I hate this place.



I’m not just saying that because my wife has expressed jealousy that she’s not here, this whole area is just awful. It’s been the worst week of my life and I want to get out of here. Just look at some of the shit I’ve had to put up with in the last 7 days.



Stupid ocean.





This area’s home to some of the largest coral reefs in the world. I hate it.



Stupid hammock.





Hammocks suck so bad you have a hard time staying awake in them.



Stupid swing chair.





At La Buena Vida, the bar stools are swings and there’s tree houses you can sit in and order drinks by lowering a bucket down on a rope. The food and drinks are super tasty and affordable and the staff is friendly. I hate it.



Pfft.





Building stupid sandcastles on a stupid picturesque beach. Whatever.



Stupid pool.





Hanging out at the pool behind the Casa Del Sol with my friends. Not my idea of fun.



The waterfall's loud.





Hanging out in the backyard of Casa Del Sol, the five bedroom house we’ve been staying at. There’s a pool and waterfall in the backyard and a path leading to a stupid lagoon where you can swim with a bunch of tropical fish or whatever. The Grateful Dead used to stay here or something. I hate it. There’s too many kitchens.



Who has fun drinking?





Drinking with my friend Chris. You can get a decent bottle of rum here for like 7 bucks. Booze has been flowing freely in the house and we’ve had parties almost every night. It sucks.



I can’t wait until this festival’s over. I hate comedy.

Magical Mexican Voyage: Day 6.

Chatting with Jena earlier today I told her I didn’t know what to blog about. She told me I should talk about what I’m doing in Mexico besides pooping. Honestly I haven’t gone out too much. There have been some parties, one of which had a surprise Mayan dance routine bust out right in the middle of everything –



Sure I was a little disappointed when I found out they weren't strippers but it was a cool show anyway.





But for the most part I’ve been writing and drinking. Not most people’s ideal for a tropical vacation but I could think of worse ways to pass the time.



It hasn’t all just been hunching over a laptop and emptying bottles of rum like some modern day fart joke Bukowski, the organizers for the Akumal Comedy Festival lined up plenty of activities for the comics and with shooting sketches on location there’s been plenty to explore. Here’s a quick rundown of what I’ve been up to –



BUSTIN’ COCONUTS
Remember this guy?



I can eat it!





Trees like that are all over the place down here and I wasn’t sure if they were coconuts because the only coconuts I’ve ever seen were the fuzzy brown bowling balls hanging off the lone tree on the tiny island in comic strips. Turns out in real life they got a big ol’ husk surrounding the bowling ball. I saw some in the back yard of the villa where the organizers and crew are staying and asked my friend and festival organizer Gus Lynch if I could have one. He gave me the go ahead and I set about on my task. Opening a coconut.



I figured Tom Hanks did it in like three days on Castaway so if I beat that time I’m good. I spiked it against the cement patio and while it didn’t bust open, the husk was softer where it hit. I peeled a little back but it was slow going. I was going to need tools. I went to the kitchen and got a paring knife. I was worried I might cut myself hacking away at it so I got the smallest blade possible. When I went back out to stab away and enjoy the sweet coconut the cinematographer for the shoots looked at me holding a knife and coconut and said “careful. I’ve seen four people cut themselves trying to open coconuts before”. I was starting to think it just might be better to go and grab a Mounds bar but I’ve mad my decision. I’m cracking this fucker open and eating it. After ten minutes of hacking away I finally saw the bowling ball. I threw it against the ground and it split open, spraying coconut water everywhere. I don’t know if it was all the effort put in but that coconut was one of the sweetest things I’ve ever eaten. I enjoyed my reward and felt assured that if I get lost in the jungle I can survive indefinitely with nothing but a paring knife.



BURNING THE SHIT OUT OF MY SKIN



I’m bald. When you’re bald you know how important it is to keep your head from burning. A sunburned bald head peels and it looks like you have the worst case of dandruff ever. It’s gross. I’ve taken care to not burn my head this trip but there’s something I forgot. I have skin on the rest of my body, too.



I’m also fat. As a fat guy I usually don’t make it a point to go to the beach or a pool party and when I do I swim with my shirt on. Here in Akumal, though, there are plenty of guys just as fat if not fatter than me running around. I’m not looking to get laid down here so fuck it, time to deal with my man boob embarrassment and just walk around with my shirt off.



Big mistake. My torso hasn’t been exposed to direct sunlight since I was ten years old. After two hours of shooting a sketch on a beach I was glowing red. An hour after that I was dizzy and cold. The pain hasn’t set in yet but I’m just waiting for one of these jackasses I’m staying with to slap me on the back so they can watch me have a seizure. Damn you, Irish ancestors!



Stay tuned this weekend. I’ll be posting bonus blogs full of interviews and pictures!



No pics of my sunburn, though. God already punished me for showing my bitch tits to the world. I’d hate to think what he’d do if I exposed them again.

Reverse Montezuma’s Revenge

I’ve been trying to make sure that I do everything right while here in Mexico. I haven’t introduced any invasive species to the environment, I bought a hat to protect my sensitive Minnesotan from the unforgiving Mexican sun,



I don't care what everybody who has seen me in this hat says. This hat is badass. I love this hat.





and most importantly, I haven’t had any tap water.



Everybody knows about the Montezuma’s Revenge. You drink the water and you poop for a week straight. wikipedia even talks about it so you know it’s real (but he was defeated by the Spanish. Shouldn’t this only affect Spanish people?). There’s plenty of bottled water here and our villas have those big water coolers but I’ve just been playing it safe and only drinking booze. I’m just trying to live healthy down here.



"If my empire shall lay in ruins so shall your boxer shorts!"





There’s just one problem. Not only have I so far successfully avoided the revenge of Montezuma, I haven’t pooped once since I arrived on Sunday evening. That’s two and a half days. It doesn’t add up. I’ve been doing nothing but eating fajitas and Pringles (Pringles are huge down here for some reason. They’re everywhere) and drinking rum and tequila. I even had a few beers (which I’m totally not supposed to do). I’ve considered having a glass of tap water just to get things going.



I think I know what the problem is. When I was a kid my family would go camping one or two weekends in the summer every year. It was a lot of fun but I hated the idea of pooping in an outhouse or the woods so I just wouldn’t. From Friday evening to Sunday afternoon I just made the decision to not poop. After doing this a dozen times it got easier and easier until I didn’t even feel the need to when camping. Like a Pavlovian response. Now that I’m in Mexico I think my guts have gone back into camping mode lockdown.



Granted, there are toilets here. I have a bathroom all to myself in the villa. This shouldn’t be a problem but when I first went to the bathroom this sign was on the wall next to the toilet.



Wait... What?





Wait… after I’m done wiping, I’m supposed to take the toilet paper and…



Oh no. No, no no no.





Oh God no. I know I’m in a different culture but seriously? I can’t just throw poopy paper in a waste basket. I pretty much have three options right now.



1. Just not poop until I’m back in the land of the septic tanks that can handle a little Charmin. Hopefully I won’t explode like the fat guy in Monty Python’s Meaning of Life.
2. Find a toilet somewhere around here that can handle toilet paper. There has to be one, right? This can’t just be something that everybody does down here.
3. Man up and work past my weird poop fear (not gonna happen).



I knew I was going to get homesick down here but I didn’t realize I’d miss my bathroom so much.






*UPDATE*
Just pooped. It was alright.

A Story About the Inconvenience of Flying Because I’m an Unoriginal, Cliched Turd.

Bill Young here blogging to you live from Akumal, Mexico! The sun is shining, the ocean is humid and filled with the sounds of animals that I’ve never seen and I’m in the bedroom of my villa with the lights off and the A/C on typing away on my laptop.



Right outside my window. Is that a coconut? Can I eat that? I'm gonna try to eat that later.





I hate what I’m about to do. The moment we got in we were greeted with a free meal and told all the comics were getting gift baskets full of goodies and coupons to local businesses. The villa was stocked with booze which we drank last night in a pool on the roof of the villa. The outside of the villa was crawling with these little gecko like lizards (adorably infested!). My only job here is to film a couple of sketches and perform in three shows. I really hate that I’m about to do this because I have no reason to complain but I’m going to bitch about the flight in.



Jena dropped me off at the MSP airport at 5:30 AM. I was set to fly out at 7:05 with 10 other people in the festival on a group flight rate. We were flying from Minneapolis Cancun with a stop in Dallas. Now, I’m a little scared of flying (part of my general fear of heights) but I’ve been on a plane about a half dozen times in my life and I’ve never really had a huge problem with it. The descent to landing is always a little nerve wracking but I’m usually fine the rest of the flight. We took off and the captain said over the intercom that there were some storms in Texas that we were going to fly around that may delay the flight a bit. I ate an airplane breakfast sandwich (which was delicious. Take that, ’80s stand up comics!), put my headphones on and dozed off listening to my ipod.



I woke up a couple of hours later and chatted with the other comics and listened to music as we approached Dallas. The captain came on the intercom again and told us there was lightning over Dallas right now and it was not safe to land. We were going to circle over Dallas for a while in a “holding pattern” to see if the storm clears up and if it didn’t, we’d land at the Wichita Falls regional airport to wait it out. It should take less than an hour but “we’re lucky we have enough fuel to circle over Dallas for a couple of hours”.



An hour passed and we were still circling around. The captain came on the intercom again and said that the conditions were still stormy so we were going to keep in the holding pattern. 45 minutes of more holding pattern and the captain told us that the Wichita Falls airport was so overrun with planes that were headed to Dallas that they were running out of fuel at that airport so we were going to keep circling and if it didn’t clear up we would go to Oklahoma Fucking City (he didn’t say “Fucking”) to refuel. We kept circling and I started trying to cope with the fact that this is where I live now. Time to start a new life in an airplane circling above Dallas and eating three dollar mini tins of Pringles (seriously they’re 75 cents at the gas station).



I started making a mental list of all the horrible things that could happen in a plane running out of fuel circling far far above Texas. We could just run out of fuel because of the captain’s foolish hope that Dallas would let us land. Just fall out of the sky into a high school football field (high school football fields make up about %60 of Texas’ geography). At least I’d finally get to see those oxygen masks pop out from the overhead compartment. I’ve only ever seen them in movies and always wondered if they even existed. Not many people survive plane crashes so you wonder if those masks even pop out when shit hits the fan. What if we hit another plane? We couldn’t be the only people waiting for Dallas to let us in. The Dallas sky was probably littered with circling planes and we were bound to crash sooner or later. Oh God there’s going to be a five plane pile up because of a storm WHY DIDN’T YOU JUST LAND IN WICHITA FALLS WHEN WE HAD THE CHANCE, CAPTAIN? YOUR FOOLISH HOPE IN DALLAS LETTING US IN HAS DOOMED US ALL!



We landed in Dallas fifteen minutes later. For those of you keeping score that was two hours of flying in circles. We spent another hour in the runway because there were so many planes trying to get in all at once. Everybody on the plane bitched about it but I was just glad to be on the ground. I would’ve kissed the ground when we got off the plane but eww, Texas.


Trip Planning.

Many of you regular reader know that I’ll be heading out to Mexico on Sunday for the Akumal Comedy Festival because I refuse to shut up about it and it’s true! I’m going to Mexico on Sunday!


I have to do a lot of preparation for this trip. As a part time road comic, I’m pretty used to throwing some underwear and a toothbrush (the only two things I ever bring when I travel) into a duffel bag and heading out to some small midwestern town for 1 to 4 nights but this trip is different. I’ll be gone for 8 days. This will be the longest I’ve ever been apart from Jena since we first started dating. This will also be my first time in a foreign country (except Canada but I really don’t think that counts. As a Minnesotan I’m pretty much Canadian anyway) and the furthest I’ve ever traveled. Here’s just a few of the steps I’ve taken to prepare for my journey.


* Watch ¡Three Amigos! for fashion tips.

I'm sure you can find that outfit at Target.




* Google a list of recommended vaccinations for travelling to mexico so I know what to tell the doctor I have when I get back. I’m pretty sure I’m up to date on most of those. I think. Oh well, Typhoid’s probably not nearly as bad as it sounds.



* Check the weather.

Oh, that's nice.



*Feel guilty that Jena’s not coming along. Make a mental note to take pictures of myself with a sad face exploring Mayan ruins, sad face sitting in the infinity pool, sad face drinking on the beach etc.



* Remember that airplanes have that stupid liquid rule. Does that mean I can’t bring my deodorant? It’s the gel kind. Does that count as liquid? I don’t want to have to buy a whole new bottle while I’m down there so I’ll just put on 8 days worth of deodorant right before I leave. I should be fine.


Pretty sure that about covers it. I’m told there’s free wireless there so I’ll should be able to put up a couple of blogs next week and still harass my facebook friends into coming to my comedy shows (New hope Cinema Grill April 27th and 28th!) if I can figure out how to use Mexican internet without getting “Montezuma’s Revenge”. The majority of the blogs next week will be done by Jena, who has the week off from work and gets to experience my life as a homemaker/bullshit comedy writer. Hopefully after walking a mile in my robe and slippers she’ll gain some perspective and realize the plight of the stay at home mom (it’s so easy).

Akumal Comedy Festival Interview: Portrait of An Artist: The People of The Akumal Comedy Festival: Profile Interview: Director Matt Olson

As some of you may know I’ll be in Akumal, Mexico all next week for the First Annual Akumal Comedy Festival and youngnotions.com will be the official blog of the festival because nobody else has staked that claim yet! Do you need approval of the festival to be the official blog? Whatever.


As the so far undisputed official blog of the Akumal Comedy Festival, we’ll be interviewing some of the performers and producers that are making this happen and are responding to my emails asking for the interview. I’m excited that our first artist interview will be with director Matt Olson!



Director Matt Olson near a camera either about to direct something or just finished directing something.




Matt Olson cut his teeth in the Minneapolis comedy scene directing for sketch comedy groups The Label and The Other Side Project. After winning the 2008 and 2009 Minneapolis 48 Hour Film Festivals with his shorts “Birthmarked For Death” and “The Grave Review”, Matt moved to Los Angeles. Since then, he’s written and directed an Emmy and Telly award winnning PSA, written a half hour comedy show for FX and is currently developing a web series for MTV. With the experience of directing over 100 live multimedia shows over the years, Matt is coming down to Akumal to not only film the festival but direct several original comedy sketches. The sketches, written and performed by the comedians of the festival, will all be shot in the the few days leading up to the fest. Youngnotions.com sits down with Matt to discuss the unique challenge of producing comedy under tight deadlines.


Bill: Given your experience with the 48 Hour Film Challenge, you’re no stranger to filming sketch comedy under tight time restrictions. For the Akumal Fest you’re going to shoot and edit several short sketches in the matter of a few days. How would you say working under such pressure changes the process? Does it help?

Matt: I think that working under tight time constraints can yield really good stuff. It pushes you to work at the top of your abilities and makes it nearly impossible to second guess your ideas. This helps make the work more honest and instinctual. Of course the good ideas couldn’t come to life or be done justice without a really solid crew. We had around 25 folks working on our first 48 hour and over 40 on the Grave Review. We have a great bunch working the Akumal shoot. Really an accomplished set of filmmakers. One of the added challenges is that there’s only four of us, so pushing that boulder’s going to take a lot effort.

Bill: You’ve only got a few people working with you on the production end this time around while you have over a dozen comedians writing for you. It’s almost a reverse of your 48 experiences with just a few writers and a large production crew. Is that going to change your process much?

Matt: Yes, I think the large amount of talent ensures I’ll be working even harder on the writing/directing side of things.
We want to include everyone who’s into this but because of our limitations it’s going to be hard to feature everyone equally.
We also don’t want to do something that’s just an extended role call. No final episode of Seinfeld for me please.
We’re still going to be pushing to make work that at actually features some character development and has a cinematic look and feel to it.
I think the key to this lies in finding thematic, comedic and ironic connections between a bunch of diverse folks playing heightened versions of themselves.

Ok maybe diverse isn’t the right word. They’re mostly a bunch of white male comedians. With this crew I guess you could find diversity in “beard/no beard” or wimpy and skinny vs. fat hairy.

Bill:Hey, way off topic but do you remember the time we were at the Nomad with Denson and you totally nerded out on that hot waitress?

Matt: Remind me.

Bill: Okay. We were all on the patio and ordered from this waitress. She came back with our drinks really fast, like a minute later. I said “Wow, that was super fast” and she said “I know, I’m just like Flash Gordon!”

Matt: Doesn’t ring a bell.

Bill: So she says “Just like Flash Gordon” and then you respond by saying “Uhhh, I think you mean ‘The Flash'”. You might have said “Uhh, I think you mean DC Comics’ ‘The Flash'” but I can’t remember.

Either way, the waitress scrunched up her face and said something to the effect of “Whatever” and left. Did you get her number after that? I can’t remember. She really seemed into being corrected on comic book trivia. Girls like that stuff.

Matt: She was obviously not my type.

Bill: Maybe you just weren’t specific enough. She probably would’ve hopped on your jock right then and there if you were just more pedantic about it. Follow it up with something like “And even then there aren’t any female Flashes so call yourself ‘Jessie Quick’ next time”.

Matt:Go fuck yourself, Bill.

Bill: Good interview.


If you’d like to see more of Matt Olson, you can find him at a comic book shop on Wednesday (that’s when the new releases come out).

Another Conversation With Jena: The Curse of the Feathered Serpent.

Here’s part of a conversation Jena and I had on the phone yesterday as I was driving home from Illinois.


ME: Don’t forget Jared has spring break next week.

JENA: I wish I had spring break.

ME: Well hey, you have a whole week off of work this month. That’s just like spring break.

JENA: Yeah, but I’ll have to do all the homemaker stuff. It’s not like I’m going to be in Mexico all week (note: she didn’t provide a hyperlink in our phone conversation. I’m doing this for you, the reader, to add some context. You’re welcome).

ME: Hey! That’s going to be hard work for me.

JENA: You’re doing what, three shows? You get to go scuba diving!

ME: Exactly! While underwater I’m basically acting as an ambassador to the surface world. Our diplomatic relationship with Poseidon’s kingdom is tense as it is. What if I fart down there? First the oil spill and now this? Aquaman will not be happy. There’s also going to be a lot of drinking on a beach, which isn’t as easy as it sounds.

JENA: Uh huh.

ME: I’m probably going to explore a bunch of Mayan Ruins, too. What if I end up knocking over an artifact and invoke the rage of Quetzalcoatl? Now I’ve got the Curse of the Feathered Serpent to deal with. This isn’t going to be easy.

JENA: You know you could use this conversation in the blog, right?

ME: Eh, only if I can’t think of anything funny tomorrow.


"WHO DARES DRUNKENLY URINATING IN THE TEMPLE OF THE FEATHERED SERPENT?!?"