I AM I Opening at the City Cinemas East Village Tonight

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Kickstarter: Jocelyn Towne on the Creation of her Film I Am I

When writer/director/actor Jocelyn Towne launched the Kickstarter project page for her film I Am I at the end of 2010, it appeared alongside an inventive video pitch for the film. In a single take, Towne and a cast of actors and close friends popped up in various rooms of the house she was living in (and also her bed), selling the concept. It’s a difficult piece of choreography, and rather than obsess over getting it exactly right, Towne allowed for a few flaws. It’s warm, watchable, and entertaining. On Friday, June 13th, the film—which is about about a woman meeting her mentally ill father, who thinks she’s his wife—will see wide release in theaters and on demand. We spoke with Towne about that notorious project video as well as what’s been happening with I Am I over the last few years.

How did you arrive at the concept for your project video?

I knew that I had to do something that stood out. I watched as many Kickstarter videos as I could get my hands on. I played devil’s advocate with my own emotions watching other people’s videos. I knew I was doing it from a very intellectual place—watching the videos. So I was like, “what’s going to move me to contribute to someone else’s project?” Most of the time it was not people who said, “we have a really heartfelt project that means the world to us.” That didn’t usually move me most of the time. Everybody has a heartfelt project, so hearing that didn’t turn the emotional meter for me, but what did usually was something that was humorous and light and funny and had me enjoy just watching the video itself. That was my inspiration for trying to come up with something that would do that for me.

It looks like it was done in one shot.

It was. I was overwhelmed by getting the project together and I thought, well if I don’t need an editor it would be so much simpler. So how can I do this on my own without needing an editor? Oh I’ll do it in one shot. Even though it took a lot of choreography, we got it in seven takes. It’s not perfect, but I didn’t need it to be. It’s good but it didn’t have to be perfectly framed every single time. It just had to have the right feeling. That’s what I was going for. Making sure the feeling was there. I wrote the script out and that took awhile just to think of the idea and then people came over that evening. I’d already rehearsed it with our DP and myself and we knew what we had to do and people just jumped in and did their parts and did them great.

When you were coming up with the idea was it just as simple as thinking that you wanted to get people over to your house?

All the people in the video are friends from my theater company, so whenever someone needs help, people from the theater company are there to help, so it wasn’t hard to get friends over to help out because that’s what we all do for each other.

There’s a weird balance between making a dramatic film and a lighthearted project video. Were you worried about it clashing with your film?

I worried about everything. I worried about that. I worried about what people would think of me for asking for money, which is kind of how I came up with the idea for the video of asking people to get into bed with you. I was like, “this is uncomfortable for me.” Asking people for money is as uncomfortable as just asking people to get into bed with me if I didn’t know them. Which is where that idea came from. I stressed out about almost every single thing in the video and the campaign, just because it was such new territory and I didn’t know that many people who had done a Kickstarter campaign before myself. Ultimately, I thought that people would relate more to me and the project if it was more lighthearted, and I hope that even though the movie is dramatic in tone, i tried to tell the story with a lightness of touch so it wasn’t too heavy-handed. I think it accomplishes that. I don’t think it’s a melodrama, so I wanted to find that with the campaign video too.

On the I Am I site you’ve been conducting interviews with your father and other filmmakers. They don’t come off as promotional, more just genuine interviews about filmmaking. Why did you do those?

There were definitely selfish reasons—the first one was my dad, so just getting to have that time. Getting him to talk about his experience and just having that closeness with him. It was also because I wanted advice from people I knew and admired. I wanted to do more of those interviews too. I had some other great people lined up. I still want to interview them about their first filmmaking experience, it’s just everything kind of took off and got really crazy and busy. It was just trying to get practical advice from friends and filmmakers about what it was like their first time making a film, and seeing if i could use any of that advice before I went into my first filmmaking experience.

Having a dad that worked in film means you probably grew up around it. Did you always want to get into it?

I was always interested in writing from a young age. I think that was definitely a huge influence from my dad because I always watched him writing in his office. That was something that’s always been part of the grand scheme of things. Becoming a filmmaker and directing was something that was very new and part of this project. I didn’t have any aspirations originally to direct it. It was my producers who told me that maybe I should consider doing it because I had written it just for myself to act in. That was what my dream was originally. Then refocusing to become the director of the story—which I realized I really wanted to be without knowing it. I realized how much control i wanted over the story. It was something that was new. I’ve fallen in love with in the process of doing my first film, and now I got to direct a second film and actually sit behind the camera the entire time. That was a newfound love as I ventured into this whole process.

Why is it important to you to have such complete control?

I think that when you’re telling a story that means a lot to you, to think of giving up control somewhere along the way to either a studio or other artists completely… I love collaborating, it doesn’t mean I don’t want to collaborate, I just love being able to have a voice in the decision making process as it goes down the road of everything: of distribution, post production, everything. I’m so glad I did it with I Am I because getting the film out into the world is just as difficult as getting it made, and a huge part of making sure that you have control of your film is making sure that you have that voice throughout the entire process.

You’ve already made a second movie, but now I Am I is getting a wide release. How do you feel about that?

It’s a very strange feeling because in some ways after making it through all of post-production, I kind of let it go and also because getting a distribution deal took awhile longer than the normal—or whatever normal is, i don’t even know anymore—it just took awhile to get a distribution deal, and to get the one we thought was right for the project. I got to see it with an audience a couple times when it did its film festival premiere and then it just sort of went into hibernation for awhile. I had to kind of let go of that feeling of getting to share it with the world, but not really feeling like i had to gotten to share it yet, because I hadn’t shared it with anyone from Kickstarter and those were all the people who helped get it made. It was this very strange feeling of work, work, work and then nobody really gets to share it with you. So the fact that it’s coming out now is really exciting and surreal. I feel lucky I get to have this part of the process too. In some ways I was accepting that just the process of working on it was enough, and now that I get to actually have the part of it where people see it, I’m remembering, oh yeah that’s what filmmaking is about: getting to share it with the world. I’m re-opening that feeling of actually getting to have an interaction with people after they see it. I’m excited about it.

When you initially put I Am I on Kickstarter it was a lot less common for films on the site to make it into wide theatrical release. At the time, did you feel like you were willfully removing yourself from the film industry when you needed to be part of it?

The way I thought of it was I was getting something done by any means necessary. It definitely felt like taking a step out of the known way of getting a film made, but I felt desperate enough to do whatever it took to get my project made. I had the fire underneath me of wanting to start a family and have children, and I felt like it was now or never—if I don’t do this now, there’s never going to be an easier time. Discovering Kickstarter was a complete revelation to me, because I hadn’t heard of it before my producers told me about it. So I started researching it, and all of a sudden it became this incredible possibility of being able to get things done on my own terms. It feels like I’ve always tried to do things that way. I think it has to do with having artistic control. I remember when I was writing the script to this, people said, “Oh, you could try and sell this. Maybe some big actress would be interested in playing this part.” I had a lot of encouragement to relinquish control of the script and see if I could sell it and just be seen as a writer. I didn’t want to be seen just as a writer, I really wanted to play that part for myself, which was why I had written it. I had to take a different road.

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BTJA: JIM PARSONS TO PRESENT LOUIS XIII GENIUS AWARD TO RYAN MURPHY

 

Show Airs Live on The CW on June 19 at 8pm ET/ 8pm PT

LOS ANGELES (June 13, 2014) – The Broadcast Television Journalists Association (BTJA) today announced the celebrity presenters for the 4th annual Critics’ Choice Television Awards (CCTA), which will air live on The CW from the Beverly Hilton Hotel on Thursday, June 19, 2014 (8:00pm ET/8:00pm PT). Actor/comedian Cedric the Entertainer, star, co-creator and executive producer of The Soul Man, host of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and host of the upcoming reality series Cedric’s Barber Battle on The CW, will host.

Presenters include CCTA nominees Lizzy Caplan (Masters of Sex), Tony Hale (Veep), Emmy Rossum (Shameless), Jim Parsons (The Big Bang Theory) and Matthew Rhys (The Americans), as well as Christina Applegate, Fred Armisen (Portlandia), Scott Aukerman (Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis), Demian Bichir (The Bridge), Danielle Brooks (Orange Is the New Black), Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia), Josh Dallas (Once Upon a Time), Kat Graham (The Vampire Diaries), Max Greenfield (New Girl), Kathy Griffin (comedian), Colin Hanks (Fargo), Angie Harmon (Rizzoli & Isles), Colton Haynes (Arrow), Diane Kruger (The Bridge), Natasha Lyonne (Orange Is the New Black), Kunal Nayyar (The Big Bang Theory), Elisabeth Moss (Mad Men), Adam Pally (The Mindy Project), Laura Prepon (Orange Is the New Black), Gina Rodriguez (Jane the Virgin), Isaiah Washington (The 100) and Shane West (Salem).

Jim Parsons will present the Critics’ Choice LOUIS XIII Genius Award, established to honor an icon in the television industry, to Ryan Murphy, the Emmy Award-winning creator, writer and director of FX’s Emmy-winning American Horror Story; FOX’s Screen Actors Guild and Emmy Award-winning Glee; and FX’s award-winning Nip/Tuck. Murphy’s latest directorial project was the HBO adaptation of Larry Kramer’s award-winning The Normal Heart, which is nominated for five CCTAs.

Best known for the Critics’ Choice Movie Awards, now going into its 20th year, the Broadcast Film Critics Association established BTJA and the Critics’ Choice Television Awards in 2011 on behalf of television journalists working in electronic media to celebrate outstanding work in television. In addition to honoring the best shows and performers from the previous season in Drama, Comedy, Reality, Movie, Mini Series, Animated and Talk Show categories, the Critics’ Choice Television Awards also spotlights the Most Exciting New Series premiering recently or in the coming months, judged from pilots, early episodes and trailers. This year’s Most Exciting New Series honorees are Extant (CBS), Gotham (FOX), Halt and Catch Fire (AMC), The Leftovers (HBO), Outlanders (Starz), Penny Dreadful (Showtime) and The Strain (FX).

Red-carpet preshow, “Live from the Critics’ Choice Television Awards,” will begin at 6:00pm ET/6:00pm PT and will air on flagship station KTLA as well as many other CW/Tribune Affiliates across the country.

Event sponsors at the 4th annual Critics’ Choice Television Awards gala on June 19 include iPic Entertainment, Pernod Ricard’s Elyx and Glenlivet, LINE, Engel & Völkers, Sabra, Sarasota Film Commission, Bradenton Area Film Commission, Flight Source, thalo, Yogurtland and Michele Watches.

E! NEWS: Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting Has Babies on Her Brain: “I Was Born to Be a Wife, Born to Be a Mom”—Watch Now!

Watch Video Here

Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting can’t wait to have kids—when the time is right.
The Big Bang Theory beauty caught up with E! News last night at the Rebecca Taylor store in Los Angeles for the launch of the designer’s Little White Dress Capsule Collection benefitting Baby Buggy, where she dished on her marriage to her hunky hubby Ryan Sweeting and opened up about her desire to have children.
So does the actress, who said “I do” to Sweeting just over six months ago, already have babies on her brain?
“Well, being at this Baby Buggy event, a little bit!” she said with a laugh before admitting, “We can’t wait. I mean, it won’t be anytime soon, but we both want to be parents so bad. We can’t wait, so hopefully it will happen.”

The 28-year-old star added that she was “born to be a wife, born to be a mom.”
“I can’t wait,” she gushed.
As for how married life is treating the stunning newlywed, who looked absolutely gorgeous in a floral Rebecca Taylor crop top and matching pants?
“I love my husband,” she said. “I’m so happy to be married, I’m really really happy.”

The adorable couple, who is never afraid to pack on the PDA, will be taking a “little vacation over the Fourth of July” before the actress heads back to work next month.
So are the lovebirds, who wed after a whirlwind courtship, still in the honeymoon phase?
“We are, yeah” she revealed. “We’ve been together for a year, so that’s very very new. I told him in my vows, ‘I will spend the rest of my life getting to know you’ so that was kind of where we we’re at.”
Too cute!

Kaley Cuoco, Bree Turner, Sarah Michelle Gellar and Rebecca Taylor Rebecca Taylor, Sarah Michelle Gellar & Tara Swennen Celebrate The Launch Of The Little White Dress Capsule Collection Benefitting Baby Buggy at Rebecca Taylor on June 12, 2014 in Los Angeles, California.

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DEADLINE: EMMYS: With Balloting Set To Start Campaign Hits Fever Pitch – But Is It All Worth It? NBC’s Award “Wizard” Richard Licata Says Yes

By PETE HAMMOND | Thursday June 5, 2014 @ 4:23pm PDT

Emmy balloting starts Monday and continues through June 20, and you would have to be living under a rock — or somewhere other than Los Angeles or New York — not to be aware that we are in the midst of perhaps the most massive, widespread Emmy campaigning ever. Is it me or has this Emmy season even seemed to eclipse the Oscars in terms of the campaign for the golden statuette, even though there is no evidence that winning an Emmy has anywhere near the financial or prestige value of an Oscar.

There are billboards , bus posters, social media, Q&As, online and print ads galore and it doesn’t stop there. On Friday night, FX is throwing a New Orleans-style feast and concert from Stevie Nicks to accompany an episode screening and Q&A of their miniseries hopeful American Horror Story: Coven. It’s just one of many such events Television Academy members have been invited to this season. And this kind of thing just seems to be proliferating year after year. Perhaps it helps that the TV Academy itself plays ball in this game. The group’s official Emmy Magazine, which goes to all 16,000-plus eligible voters, is chock full of ads both inside and outside. Just to get to the actual magazine itself you have to rip off a Good Wife snipe, get past a glossy four-sided fake cover for Big Bang Theory and other Warner Bros shows, and dispense with an elaborate insert and DVD promoting CBS reality shows. Once you hit the “real” cover which features Fox’s Sleepy Hollow, it actually opens immediately into a massive HBO Emmy campaign ad for True Detective followed by nine more pages of ads before even hitting the table of contents. (Oh, and did we mention Sleepy Hollow itself had a big screening event at Hollywood Forever Cemetery on Monday?)

Of course the Academy Of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences does none of that, but doesn’t prevent campaigning to its members during Oscar season. But, while being even-handed and playing no favorites, the TV Academy does realize some income from all those ads and even hired a new head of ad sales this year, Hollywood trade veteran Rose Einstein (it should be noted Deadline is also chock full of Emmy ads). The studios and production companies all seem to have Emmy fever. Just witness the usual pile of elaborately packaged shows that arrive at every member’s doorstep. It wasn’t always this way. Although campaigns waged for Oscars have always seemed to be intense and elaborate, using the same methods to win an  Emmy nomination is relatively new by comparison. To learn the evolution of it all I turned to a man who has been called “the wizard behind the Emmy curtain” and the guy who pulls “the campaign levers.” Richard Licata has been NBC Entertainment’s EVP Communications since 2011 but previously worked at Showtime, Fox Broadcasting, HBO and Rogers & Cowan. At each of those places he developed a knack, and a love for, the art of Emmy campaigning and as it has increased year to year he’s usually there with some new innovation to move it forward. It started for him when he was at HBO in 1991 and launched a nascent Emmy campaign for the TV movie The Josephine Baker Story resulting in numerous nominations and a Lead Actress statuette for star Lynn Whitfield. Licata doesn’t believe that surprise win was by accident. That year he even convinced a local video store chain to stock cassettes of the movie and took out trade ads directing Academy voters to the stores where they could check them out for free. It was an instant success.

“In 1991  The Josephine Baker Story triggered my interest in doing what the movie people  had done for decades,” he said. “Why couldn’t television also put their so-called ‘best of the year’ in the center ring so that people would either revisit it or acknowledge it with Emmys.  That’s when it started.” He added: “I think people realized you could speak to the TV Academy voters in a lot of various ways and get them to focus on the programming. It is really kind of a wonderful golden age of television now where there is so much good dramatic and comedic television that it’s worth trying to persuade voters to look at them. I have never seen so many billboards for Emmy consideration in my whole career as there are this year.” He added that wasn’t really the practice at the time he decided to do a couple of Dexter Emmy consideration billboards in 2011 while still at Showtime. Showtime also pioneered the OnLine screening room for full episodes. After they did that, the TV Academy followed with its own site offering the same service for members.

Among other innovations Licata tried was going early. Showtime had a series called Huff in 2005 which drew very low ratings when it debuted in November. In January, eight months before Emmy night, he packaged the entire series and sent it to the Academy membership. It became the first full-season DVD sent out and went on to earn a shocking seven Emmy nominations (and won two). Coincidence? Probably not. As Licata says, why wait until May when there’s a glut of these things and no one has the time to watch them all? When he was at Rogers & Cowan he opened a division dedicated to Emmy campaigns. Among the first clients was FX and The Shield.  They send out a DVD box with a light that lit up when you opened it. Star Michael Chiklis was the surprise winner that year for Lead Actor in a Drama Series. For the 2002 sci-fi miniseries Taken, he sent an elaborate globe containing the DVDs. It won the Best Miniseries Emmy. “It was an ecological disaster but it did the trick,” Licata laughs.

At NBC he says they were already doing innovative work when he arrived three years ago but since have been adding new wrinkles including branding buses, digital billboards, and social media including Facebook and Google/Gmail ads. They also put episodes for consideration on American Airline flights between New York and LA  and even clips in New York taxi cabs. NBCUniversal’s 21-page spread in the new Emmy Magazine begins with a sealed envelope containing a message to voters pushing the new NNBU Screen It app for iPads to watch full episodes and instructions on where to find your password. Licata also says that he can tell the TV Academy membership is getting younger just by the response to their screening room site. “The usage is extraordinary. Sometimes we look at the numbers and wonder if they made a mistake. Times have changed dramatically and people watch things online and their handheld devices and it has really helped in spreading the (Emmy) word,” he said.

Licata also feels it is important to be even handed in dealing with Emmy campaigns.  That’s why he has two simultaneous campaigns going for The Tonight Show. There’s one for the old one “With Jay Leno.” And one for the new one “Starring Jimmy Fallon.” He hopes they both pan out. “It’s even-steven. It’s equal time. We are being aggressive with Jay to pay tribute to his 20 years on this network, and his last year was terrific. It’s kind of like an embarrassment of riches so we hope both of them come in,”  he said. Leno may be an exception for sentimental reasons, but programs currently on the air almost always take precedence. In other words don’t look for NBC or any other player in the Emmy game to spend a lot of money on cancelled shows.

But again, is an Emmy really worth all this time, money and effort?

“My battle cry has always been that it’s great to win the gold, but I have always treated this as a really terrific branding opportunity for a network,” Licata says. “You get your product out there, not only the show but you showcase your talent and show them you care about them. I think Emmys are important in a very crowded television landscape. Does it bring in more viewers?  I am not certain that it has the impact an Oscar has on a gross, but I definitely think it is one of the tools that helps build a show.” So don’t expect campaigning for Emmys to stop anytime soon.

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Craig makes CBS’s ‘The Big Bang Theory’ Co-Star Simon Helberg Squirm for His Shameless Plug

Simon Helberg show bombed Craig Ferguson last night to plug his new film ‘I am I‘.   This is so funny!  Enjoy by clicking on the link below.  Simon only appears in the first segment before the show open song.

Simon Helberg on Craig

Broadway World: Tony Hale, Jim Parsons & More to Present at CRITICS CHOICE AWARDS

Tony Hale, Jim Parsons & More to Present at CRITICS CHOICE AWARDS

June 13, 2014 11:53  👤by TV News Desk

Tony Hale, Jim Parsons & More to Present at CRITICS CHOICE AWARDS The Broadcast Television Journalists Association (BTJA) today announced the celebrity presenters for the 4th annual Critics’ Choice Television Awards (CCTA), which will air live on The CW from the Beverly Hilton Hotel on Thursday, June 19, 2014 (8:00pm ET/8:00pm PT). Actor/comedian Cedric the Entertainer, star, co-creator and executive producer of The Soul Man, host of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and host of the upcoming reality series Cedric’s Barber Battle on The CW, will host.

Presenters include CCTA nominees Lizzy Caplan (Masters of Sex), Tony Hale (Veep), Emmy Rossum (Shameless), Jim Parsons (The Big Bang Theory) and Matthew Rhys (The Americans), as well as Christina Applegate, Fred Armisen (Archer, Portlandia), Scott Aukerman (Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis), Demian Bichir (The Bridge), Danielle Brooks (Orange Is the New Black), Carrie Brownstein (Portlandia), Josh Dallas (Once Upon a Time), Kat Graham (The Vampire Diaries), Max Greenfield (New Girl), Kathy Griffin (comedian), Colin Hanks (Fargo), Angie Harmon (Rizzoli & Isles), Colton Haynes (Arrow), Diane Kruger (The Bridge), Natasha Lyonne (Orange Is the New Black), Kunal Nayyar (The Big Bang Theory), Elisabeth Moss (Mad Men), Adam Pally (The Mindy Project), Laura Prepon (Orange Is the New Black), Gina Rodriguez (Jane the Virgin), Isaiah Washington (The 100) and Shane West (Salem).

Jim Parsons will present the Critics’ Choice LOUIS XIII Genius Award, established to honor an icon in the television industry, to Ryan Murphy, the Emmy Award-winning creator, writer and director of FX’s Emmy-winning American Horror Story; FOX’s Screen Actors Guild and Emmy Award-winning Glee; and FX’s award-winning Nip/Tuck. Murphy’s latest directorial project was the HBO adaptation of Larry Kramer’s award-winning The Normal Heart, which is nominated for five CCTAs.

Best known for the Critics’ Choice Movie Awards, now going into its 20th year, the Broadcast Film Critics Association established BTJA and the Critics’ Choice Television Awards in 2011 on behalf of television journalists working in electronic media to celebrate outstanding work in television. In addition to honoring the best shows and performers from the previous season in Drama, Comedy, Reality, Movie, Mini Series, Animated and Talk Show categories, the Critics’ Choice Television Awards also spotlights the Most Exciting New Series premiering recently or in the coming months, judged from pilots, early episodes and trailers. This year’s Most Exciting New Series honorees are Extant (CBS), Gotham (FOX), Halt and Catch Fire (AMC), The Leftovers (HBO), Outlanders (Starz), Penny Dreadful (Showtime) and The Strain (FX).

Red-carpet preshow, “Live from the Critics’ Choice Television Awards,” will begin at 6:00pm ET/6:00pm PT and will air on flagship station KTLA as well as many other CW/Tribune Affiliates across the country.

Event sponsors at the 4th annual Critics’ Choice Television Awards gala on June 19 include iPic Entertainment, Pernod Ricard’s Elyx and Glenlivet, LINE, Engel & Völkers, Sabra, Sarasota Film Commission, Bradenton Area Film Commission, Flight Source, thalo, Yogurtland and Michele Watches.

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E! News: Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting Hates the Sound of Her Own Voice: “It’s Nasally”

by Bruna Nessif | Thu., Jun. 12, 2014 6:13 PM PDT

Even some of the biggest celebrities have their insecurities, and in Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting‘s case, it’s her voice.

The Big Bang Theory star revealed that interesting tidbit during a roundtable chat with New Girl‘s Zooey Deschanel, Nurse Jackie‘s Edie Falco, The Mindy Project‘s Mindy Kaling Shameless‘ Emmy Rossum and Orange Is the New Black‘s Taylor Schilling for The Hollywood Reporter.

When asked if the ladies ever critiqued themselves while watching their respective shows, Kaley admitted, “I hate the sound of my voice. I can hear it from a mile away—it’s nasally. Why do I talk like that? It freaks me out!”

Zooey added, “No one likes their own voice.”

“OK, because I feel like I have the most annoying one,” Cuoco-Sweeting responded. “It’s hard for me to watch Big Bang. I TiVo it at home to support the show, but there are 37 episodes on there [I haven’t seen].”

But Kaley is extra appreciative of all of the support from fans of the show. In fact, she confessed that she can’t help but get emotional about it.

“It’s also amazing when people come up to you, and you’ve actually touched them in some sort of way because of your show. It makes me want to cry every time, I mean, literally you are so overwhelmed,” she said.

“We film in front of a live audience, and about five years ago, [co-star] Johnny Galecki and I started going into the audience and talking to everybody halfway through each show. It has helped me tremendously. We shake hands and thank everybody. I want to cry every time! It’s a big energy jolt.”

Aw, so sweet!

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Variety Studio Emmy Contender Portraits

Jim Parsons
“The Normal Heart”

“I would host ‘Saturday Night Live’ again in a heartbeat; I would do it today if it was Saturday. It may be in some way the most exciting thing I’ve done since I’ve been working professionally. … It was heaven. It was like when you’re 15 and you’re going to go on stage for
the first time.”

Mayim Bialik

“The Big Bang Theory”

“I think there’s a specific look for each of our characters. For me, I’m grateful that I don’t have to stand up straight. I don’t wear Spanx. I can wear a totally plain bra to work and no one cares. No one looks twice at me. I take the shortest (time) of all the females in hair and makeup. I’m treated like one of the guys. I get, like, the guy call time.”

Simon Helberg

“The Big Bang Theory”

“We were just very lucky. We came out of the gate doing just (OK). It wasn’t explosive. Then the (writers’) strike happened and actually helped us because they just kept rerunning the show. We just forced people to watch, and as the season went on, we grew and we’ve continued to grow, which is really rare. It’s hard for me to actually absorb the fact that we are a big hit.”

Melissa Rauch

“The Big Bang Theory”

“There is not much that I do have in common with Bernadette other than the fact that we’re both really short. But she has no problem expressing her anger and I definitely do. And so that’s been really nice when I start yelling on the show, it’s like, ‘This feels awesome! This feels really good!’”

 

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LA WEEKLY: What do The Big Bang Theory, Howard Stern and Vegan Cookbooks Have In Common? Mayim Bialik

By Ryan Ritchie Fri, Jun 13, 2014 at 6:00 AM

Mayim Bialik

As if holding a doctorate degree in neuroscience from UCLA, starring on the hit television shows The Big Bang Theory and Blossom and being a mother to two sons wasn’t enough, Mayim Bialik has just published a cookbook. Titled Mayim’s Vegan Table, the book includes more than 100 recipes. Bialik is also celebrating the release of her book with an appearance Monday at Mohawk Bend. The event – part of the restaurant’s Authors Worth Celebrating series – features four courses from the book and some discussion from the now 38-ear-old Los Angeles native about each dish.

We caught up with Bialik to ask how her cookbook came about and whether or not she’s nervous about having her recipes cooked for a large group of strangers. Sadly, we never answered any of her responses with “whoa.”

Denise Herrick Borcert

Mayim Bialik: I grew up in L.A., so it’s kind of a thrill to speak to you. I grew up with the Weekly as our standard paper in the house. The New York Times and LA Weekly – that was my household. I can’t wait to tell my parents. They’ll be super excited. I had so many moments of my childhood where my dad would ask me to get out of the car and pick up a Weekly.

Squid Ink: Let’s hope I don’t blow it. So, tell me about your event. How did you get together with Mohawk Bend?

MB: This is a restaurant I’ve been going to since it opened. Living in L.A., there’s a wide variety of really fun places where you can get vegetarian and vegan food, but Mohawk Bend, to me, is so exceptional because you can go there with your meat-eating friends and everyone can be happy. It’s not like there’s one item for vegans that you either like or you’re screwed; it’s not like taking a meat-eater to a vegan place and having them grump about it.

I didn’t even know about this series. They said, “Would you let us host you?” I was never a cool kid; I grew up in L.A. and I was kind of a goth kid. I’ve always been weird, so to have a hipster restaurant ask me to be there is super exciting. I always feel like I’m not cool enough to go to Mohawk Bend, but I go there anyway. So this is really fun.

SI: Have you ever cooked or had your recipes used for as many people as will be in attendance Monday?

MB: No and that makes me really nervous. I trust Mohawk Bend so much because I’ve eaten there so many times and I really respect their chefs. In doing tours for my cookbook, I did appearances on some pretty big national things. Two, in particular, cooked food from the book. The Rachael Ray show did an amazing job with my cupcakes. By that, I mean they tasted good and I was happy for them to be shared with the live studio audience.

I went on another very large, popular show and it was horrible. It wasn’t the way I would have cooked it and they must have used weird substitutes that I don’t use. I felt really bad, especially because none of the hosts were vegan and they kind of had to pretend it was tasty even though it wasn’t. Not because the recipes weren’t tasty but because it just wasn’t prepared right. So, I’m extremely nervous to have this many people eating my recipes, but I’m assuming because Mohawk Bend does food so well that they’ll know if it doesn’t taste right or if they use a different brand of something.

My recipes are fairly easily – it’s actually kind of hard to mess them up, so I’m looking forward to seeing what sort of flair they add to it.

SI: You might be surprised at how your food comes out.

MB: I might always want them to cook things from my cookbook and I’ll be paying to eat there every night.

SI: What’s your role during the event?

MB: I’ll be talking about each of the courses. The idea is that before each course, I talk about where the recipe came from and why. Maybe a funny anecdote because I have many funny anecdotes about food. I’ll probably speak generally about the book about how and why it came about.

SI: So, how and why did the book come about? I mean this as a compliment, but your recipes seem pretty basic, like these aren’t recipes I couldn’t do.

MB: I’m kind of a normal person. I’m not like, “Look at me, I’m a celebrity and here’s my cookbook and if you eat this way your life will be perfect.” I’m a normal mom who’s budgeted. I don’t eat out all the time and I don’t have a nanny. And I don’t have an exciting life.

Over the years I had kids, I was not acting and I was not living an extravagant lifestyle. I had to find things that worked to cook for my kids. The appeal for this book was supposed to be for every parent and not just parents living in Los Angeles or New York or San Francisco, where you can get tempeh easily. The idea was to present recipes that are palatable, not just for vegans but for people who are simply trying to incorporate more fruits and vegetables into their diet, – which everyone should be, says every major medical organization.

SI: Have you encountered any skepticism? Stuff like, “Oh, here goes another celebrity writing a cookbook?”

MB: Sure. Honestly, I was most nervous because I’m the person who was like, “Really? I’m a celebrity cookbook person now?”

I tried to stay true to the recipes I make. I’m not fancy and I never will be. And that’s how I tried to present it. In terms of the reception we got, I think we did pretty well. I mean, Howard Stern asked to have me on to talk about this book. We were mentioned in Redbook, places that typically are appealing to a different kind of audience than the celebrity chef, which I’m definitely not.

SI: Everyone knows you’re the smartest person in the room. That must lend itself to easing the skepticism.

MB: I don’t know. People have such deep-rooted neurosis surrounding food. A lot of people have created a bad parent in their head, and if they deviate from the way they were raised, if they deviate from the way they think about food, it’s like they’re going to be punished. I’ve found my intelligence doesn’t go far in a lot of places.

Mayim’s Vegan Table dinner with Mayim Bialik: $30. Monday, June 16, from 6:30 – 9:30. at Mohawk Bend, 2141 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles; 213-483-2337. Tickets available online.

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