NOLA Film Scene with Tj & Plaideau
A podcast about acting, filmmaking, and the improv scene in New Orleans.
NOLA Film Scene with Tj & Plaideau
Cartoon Memories and Convention Tales with Danny Trejo
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Imagine growing up on a steady diet of Thundercats, GI Joe, and He-Man, and then getting the chance to chat with Larry Kinney, the legendary voice of Lion-O himself! This episode is a nostalgic treasure trove where we recount not just our exclusive interview with Larry, but also our fond memories of the golden era of cartoons. Beyond the animation, we explore the unique bond within the voice acting community—so different from the cut-throat world of on-screen acting. We also share some heartwarming and hilarious tales from meeting icons like Rowdy Roddy Piper and Macho Man Randy Savage at conventions. And let's not forget to celebrate Brian's incredible win for Best Actor at the Abita Springs International Film Festival!
Follow us on IG @nolafilmscene, @kodaksbykojack, and @tjsebastianofficial. Check out our 48 Hour Film Project short film Waiting for Gateaux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5pFvn4cd1U
I'm TJ and, as always, I'm Plato welcome back to Noah film scene.
Speaker 1:Brian and I have been pretty busy of late. We've interviewed quite a few guests, we've been doing some editing and we've got some really interesting episodes in store. Just today we dropped a really fun episode with Larry Kinney, the voice of Lion-O from Thundercats. That was a cartoon I grew up watching. It was Thundercats, gi Joe and there were about four. I'd get home from school and have to do homework real quick and then we'd jump on the afternoon cartoons and Thundercats was always in the lineup.
Speaker 2:Yep, there are Transformers in there.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's, right, Yep Transformers.
Speaker 2:And were you a He-Man fan? Yeah, oh yeah, yep, all the boy stuff.
Speaker 1:For sure. Yeah, talking to Larry was really cool, just hearing his stories and hearing him do some of the voices iconic voices that we were used to hearing growing up. He was the voice of Count Chocula from commercials. He was the voice of Sonny the Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs Bird. He was just really funny talking to him in person.
Speaker 2:Totally. I love it, especially in the voice acting community, voice acting and improv you find some very cool people. Now we've met a lot of actors that are great, but sometimes, because people are fighting to get on screen, those people are more cutthroat. That's what I hear. I haven't had that experience because in this market, it's us, it's Hick, it's all our people, all our friends, and we're all trying to lift each other up.
Speaker 2:So that's yeah, that's true, you meet your heroes and they are heroes like Larry, I won't say a couple of times in Comic-Cons with photo ops, it might not have been the best experience. Hey, how you doing Take the picture. Thanks for your money. Bye, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can tell. You can tell when you walk up to them they're tired. There were a group of actors and a retired Major League Base the tents and meet them and they were nice in person but you could tell they were tired. I remember what it was like getting off that plane and being jet lagged and then having to step into that heat and you're just not adjusted to it. Even being tired, they were personable. But you know not to press those boundaries.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I went to Mad Monster Party Graw here in New Orleans in like 2011, 2012. And one of the guests was Rowdy Rowdy Piper. I really wanted to meet him. That was one of my main goals, but on Friday he had flown in and this was right after his cancer scare. I say scare, he actually had to fight it and then he went up and went to sleep. By the time I got there, I think I got there at six and they opened the doors at four and the people running it was like, oh, we'll go wake him up. I was like you will not go wake that man up. Are you out of your mind? So I saw him, I think on Sunday.
Speaker 2:My wife didn't go that day, so I didn't have my camera person. I had my they live t-shirt, I had my sunglasses and I brought the bubble gum to make sure he had enough bubble gum. He wouldn't kick anybody's ass. The picture's out of focus because the guy in line took it and this was pre-camera phones. This was the age of flip phones. You know what I mean. So I'm still glad that I didn't bug the guy. Then he signed a they Live poster, even though I'm more pictures than photo ops, but that was part of the deal. Great, super nice guy. You can't get any better than Rowdy Roddy Piper.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so in our very first episode we talked about both being wrestling fans when we were growing up and I kind of forgot about some of these stories. But when I was in San Diego I did security and we did big events football games, rock concerts, wrestling events, you name it. We did that sort of thing and I was backstage for a WCW event. I guess that was before that was right about the time. It was still WWF before it became event. Yeah, I guess that was before that was right about the time. It was still WWF before it became WWE.
Speaker 1:So the big rival was WCW and backstage I was just mere feet away from Macho man. Macho man, randy Savage, yeah, and they did their scene. They had all the lights and you know the producers were all back there and they're standing back there and they were doing one of the rivalry arguments and then one of them got slammed or whatever. And then when they cut, they helped each other up and they walked off arm and arm and I'm like, ah, and that was before I really understood all the ins and outs about what wrestling was, and seeing those guys in person was really cool and they were all so nice we weren't supposed to talk to them and engage with them. But they would say hello and they would be polite and I thought it was really cool because on camera on TV they play a bad guy, but off camera they were very personable.
Speaker 2:Right. It's like if you work background in a TV movie, don't bug the stars, but if they say hello, you're allowed to talk to them like a human being and the other thing. It's not a scene, it's cutting a promo. Right. When they do that backstage clip part, it's not doing a scene. Fair enough, cool. So folks like TJ said we've been extremely busy these past couple of months and we did a 48 hour film and we did a seven and seven film for the Abita Springs International Film Festival.
Speaker 1:Congratulations by the way, thank you.
Speaker 1:Let me just throw that out there. I've got to throw a big congratulations Brian's way. I know he's trying to tell a story and talk about the two films that we just shot, but I need to throw this congratulations out there. Brian was nominated for Best Actor and won, and I can't wait for people to see this film because you did a phenomenal job. You really did, and it was such a fun film to make. We had a bunch of our friends there. We had seven days to make it. If you want to talk about how the 48 and the seven and seven works for people that aren't aware of it, we can do that. You were also nominated for best supporting actor for the 48. So now that I've stolen your thunder a little bit, go ahead.
Speaker 2:Not stealing my thunder. Thank you very much, and I'll throw some thunder back your way, because you were also nominated for the 48 Hour Film Project for Best Supporting Actor. We had a fight against each other and we both lost to this guy, mike.
Speaker 1:Michael Darden for the movie my Mug.
Speaker 2:He was a very good actor. I liked his performance in that one because he never pushed, he never tried to show an emotion and his character was very low key and he stuck with it. Not saying anything bad about either one of our performances, but also leading up to it we were teasing each other like, oh they trying to split up NOLA film scene. They trying to get us man.
Speaker 1:And he did a great job. So, michael, we didn't get a chance to meet. Don't know if you will ever even listen to this, but if you do, congratulations.
Speaker 2:Congratulations, and I was pulling for you actually. Oh, thank you, Because in our 48 hour film I'll pat myself on the back. I came up with the title waiting for ghetto because we had to use the name. Let me back up again. So 48 hour film is a competition. You enter your team, you can assemble your equipment, but you don't know what you're going to do. So on Friday you pick two genres out of a hat. We got mockumentary and inspirational, but there were things like music video, Western, sci-fi, social media social media influencer social media influence.
Speaker 2:You just don't know what you're going to get. And then you're given a line, a prop and a character name slash, occupation you have to use. Everybody has to use those things the same, and it was Jake or Jade Gatteau. The line was how did you find it? And the prop was a coffee cup. One of our members, janet McCaffrey, is a lawyer in real life and she let us use her office as a home base Because one of the things with the 48, you really don't want to be running around doing all kinds of different sets. You really don't want to be running around doing all kinds of different sets. You want to maximize your time. So when we got mockumentary and we were already in an office, I was like let's not go anywhere. So a lot of people are like, oh, you copy the office. We didn't. But as Jana's husband said when she was worried about it, the office copied the office. So it doesn't matter and you know Spinal Tap was watching it.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you and.
Speaker 2:I don't know how to describe it, but it was we were both caught by the camera and when we looked and just froze, the audience fell out. When you looked at Matt because this one we can share with you but one of the office mates, matt Carroll, who was also the writer and director, his character was over the top, brown noser and then he's like see you later, guys, hasta mañana, taco Tuesday. And we look at him like he's crazy. The audience. They cracked up for you so, like TJ, should win on the seven and seven competition instead of being two days. Oh, and I still didn't describe the 48.
Speaker 2:Friday you find out what it is, then you write it, film it, edit it and turn it in by Sunday night. So it's a monster. You're not going to sleep much that weekend and we kind of talked about it with Larry. We didn't win, but we had a lot of crowd response. I didn't hear anyone say that it was bad. Yeah, and you can run into technical problems on that 48 while you're hustling, like a friend of ours. Their sound dropped out, their equipment failed, so so many things can go wrong because you're fighting that time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's not a whole lot of time for pickups. Right, you've only got 48 to do everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's how I described it in Larry's episode. I'm just so happy I'm going to say it. We made a piece of art. Yeah, sometimes I'm hesitant to say that. I don't want to sound too pompous any more pompous than I usually am but I felt so proud of that. I'll share that with people. And our premieres and our awards ceremonies. It was a lot of fun. Yeah, the Abita Springs International Film Festival has a competition within it called the 7 in 7. You have seven days to make a seven minute film. And again, I forgot about the 48 hour film. That's also a seven minute film. You can only do four minutes minimum to seven minutes maximum. Abita, the 7 in 7 is five minutes minimum, seven maximum.
Speaker 1:And that's only the film. It's not pre-roll and it's not post credits.
Speaker 2:Right, just your content. You got to keep that tight story. There are a lot of rules to it, their thing. They want to bring people to a beat of Springs. So you're given a location and we got a place called the pavilion and then we were able to pick our own genre. So we picked Western. We were given the line there must be something in the water and the prop was a toothbrush. And then it was just make your movie. We all assembled our cowboy gear and going as authentic as we could. Our friend Hick Jeremy was in it and he had done some Westerns independent movies, so he already had those kind of costume pieces and just added a hat. Once we made the decision, I got myself a duster. I already had the cowboy boots. I did get a new hat also, and we all went as authentic as we could and you kind of got the mask. If you had a vest you didn't have to have the perfect shirt, yada, yada, yada. Oh, and TJ, I thought about it later we didn't have spurs, that's true.
Speaker 2:Or even the sound effects. I was like oh, when I heard that in a different movie I was like why didn't we think of that? Tj knew of people with and we did a scene like we were transporting the prisoner and they filmed us going away from the camera. And when we turned my horse, saw the gate and said I don't care.
Speaker 3:And she giddy up calm down.
Speaker 2:And then it was July in the New Orleans area. I cannot describe to you the heat and humidity.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:If you haven't been here. So we are in canvas pants and I'm in that duster. We were sweating bullets. Whoa cowboy hats. Yeah, and TJ, if I didn't say it before this. Thank you so much for the compliment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course.
Speaker 2:So there are moments when I feel like an actor and then even sometimes like an artist, where you hit exactly what you want to do and there was a gunfight scene. Now my character was not the brave sheriff. I was not the brave sheriff, I was a sheriff but I wasn't the brave gunfighter. I was kind of a goofball, scared to be in that fight, not used to it, you know, kind of a wannabe. So I was turning in the bad guy to. I was claiming the bounty. I had taken off my gloves because the gloves would not fit into my gun. It's a prop gun and the bad guy hands me this little pouch for the money and then the gunfight starts.
Speaker 2:And so my scene the camera's on me for closeups and Hick, sharing me, points his prop gun. Now, there's no ammo involved, you can't even load the gun. But Hick has this stare and that kind of scared me just looking at him. I'll tell you that. But imagine having all this stuff in my left hand, the guns in my right, Cause I had to kind of pull it out like, oh no, I'm in a gunfight, Even the prop.
Speaker 2:You had to cock the hammer each time before you shot. As I'm doing this. I'm looking at Hick and I'm picturing bullets going past me like it was a real thing and in my mind I actually heard them. I felt the breeze of the bullet. I was that much into the moment. It was amazing. I was able to cock the hammer twice. The third time I couldn't make my thumb work and I'm thinking I'm about to get shot. I'm thinking I'm about to get shot. I'm out in the open, they're going to kill me, and I reach over with all the stuff in my hand, I cock and I pull up and there's this look on my face, which you've seen in the stills we've shared. It's so stupid looking, but it was. I didn't try to make a face is what I'm saying, and that moment was probably the pinnacle of my acting career so far. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah want to say. In addition to Brian winning the film won three other awards. We won Best Editing, we won Best Film, which was the overall film, and Best Directing, and others were also nominated. Hick was nominated. Alicia Liu was also nominated for Best Acting. I think 11 nominations total that film received at the Abita Springs International Film Festival. I'm pretty proud of what we turned out with that project. It was really fun to make. It was almost over before it started. I know we had seven days to make it, but once we got to set and got rolling and got working on it, the whole time just kind of flew by for me. And same thing with the 48. It just it flew by. And such a positive experience. That's my first time doing a 48. And it was also my first time doing this seven and seven and I couldn't think of a better team that I would want to work with for either one of them. I'm grateful to everybody that we worked with on those two projects.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, and we have to give a big shout out to Matt. He wrote both of those in the first night of each competition and there really wasn't. There's a little improv in, but it was, it was on the paper. He's really good at that. And then Jonathan Boots Sigler Boots being his nickname, kind of apropos for our Western he had the equipment. He does that part for a living. So we had a fantastic camera and equipment and when he edits I saw it on the 48, his hands move like Beethoven on the piano.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we edited it for three days Monday, tuesday, wednesday and it was due on Wednesday night and it was hard. We actually have more footage. We had to bring it down to a seven and hopefully we're going to be sending out to other film festivals. That's the plan. But when the crunch started happening, just watching him go, it was amazing, really talented. It's so great to be around talented people, talented actors like you, hick I've admired Hick for years and to compete against him, I didn't even know they were doing the awards that night With the 48, we had a premiere, they had another showing and then they had their awards. Yeah, this was premiere. I didn't end up going, I was wiped out after all the filming and my work and heat and classes. And so my phone, falling asleep on a Friday night and it starts lighting up Congratulations, you won congrats. Like. What are you talking about? They did the what. I couldn't sleep for a few hours, but still it's a nice way to go to sleep.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. So it is comic book convention season and there are some conventions that are going on right now. Brian is a big convention goer and he recently got to meet a pretty big star at one of the conventions, got to interview him. So Brian will tell us about that and we'll share a little bit of that here.
Speaker 2:Yes, a while back for Fan Expo, new Orleans, because of this podcast I was able to get some press passes and I talked to a few people. I love talking to the voice actors. I talked to an amazing star, danny Trejo yeah, such a great guy, so down to earth. When I talk to people I try to throw out a little bit about myself, so then I'm not just a somebody running around with a microphone, but I tend to go overboard talking about myself, and at one point Danny even said who's interviewing who? I think I'm interviewing you, and he was still gracious enough and we'd like to share that with you now. Hey, you're with Danny trail. My name is Brian Plato. No, the film seat podcast. We have a few, brian, I Don't get us confused. My last name is Plato, just like the play, but it's French. Awesome. My first movie working background Jay and Silent Bob reboot. Loved it, yeah. And then I went on. I was in Bill and Ted Face the Music. That's photo, double Cool. And I was at the first week.
Speaker 3:I didn't get to talk to you. That's why I was out of there when we talked.
Speaker 2:I'd love to have you as a guest, but if you just want to listen, and then Demian Football.
Speaker 3:I'm interviewing him. Did I have this? That is for you? That's strange, very cool.
Speaker 2:So I'll ask you a quick question what do you think of New Orleans? What have you done in New Orleans that you can say?
Speaker 3:on video. I've probably been to New Orleans since 1979. I actually opened up a detox clinic here and God for Western Pacific Med Corp. We opened up and worked for nine months and then I've been here about eight times and I love New Orleans. I was almost heartbroken when Katrina hit. We tried to send money, do whatever we could do. We ended up with some animals in LA from Katrina yeah, yeah, god, I can't remember. Oh, pitbulls and Parolees saved a whole lot of us. Yes, sir. We love you guys.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, totally, totally.
Speaker 3:And then actually Linda Blair. She got some too, you know, from Katrina. So it's just been a beautiful city, you know, yes, sir, it gets in your soul.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, we are unique. When Pitbulls and Parolees moved here, I worked the street fair with my friend. I was in the booth and I was the car. I was like, hey, come try this gumbo I get people's things like that.
Speaker 3:People don't understand. If you see a mean big man, look at the owner, because it takes the personality. Yes, you know, if you're a beautiful woman, you have a dog that'll let kids eat out of their bowl. I mean it's like unreal, I knew. I mean I got two, I got two and my little chihuahua is the one that takes their food. Yeah, I had a baby and a little dog. She's a scarier too, you know. So I love them. It's very gaudy. I love animals and we rescue them Excellent.
Speaker 2:Danny, I appreciate your time. I know you got a lot to do. God bless you.
Speaker 3:I hope to have you on, but at least listen, that is your football.
Speaker 2:All right, you know Stephanie Hodge from the 80s. She was a stand-up and she did nurses and, unhappily, ever after I made friends with her. We laugh so much we make it up. My co-host's ribs hurt at the end of the episode.
Speaker 1:All right. Thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time. Bye, folks.
