Interview: Anna Hozian and Brad Riddell
A conversation with the co-writers and co-directors of the award winning web series “Other People’s Children”.
I have tracked the emergence of web series since the launch of my blog in 2008. In a very real way, the Internet is a distribution system and the idea that someone could create video content — and with the development of digital technologies, do so inexpensively — then put it out there for anyone to watch has always intrigued me as it’s in the wheelhouse of what I call The Spirit of the Spec.
Over the years, countless web series have come and gone. Here are links to just some of them I’ve covered: Kyle Piccolo: Comic Shop Therapist, The Guild, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Circle of 8, Project X: The True Story of Power Plant 67, Cataclysmo and the Time Boys, Cataclysmo and the Battle for Earth, Nora Breaks Free, Trunk: A Love Story, The Black Dawn, Gemini Division. Some are doubtless dead links at this point underscoring the reality of come and GONE.
Amidst the graveyard of vanished projects, it seems to me the path of least resistance to achieving success in a web series is to find some great comic talent and do something simple: High concept. Excellent acting. Strong directing. Quality production and post work.
Which brings me to a new web series called ‘Other People’s Children’, the brainchild of co-writers and co-directors Anna Hozian and Brad Riddell. Here is a description of ‘Other People’s Children’:
OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN is the story of Margot Antler (Atra Asdou), a twenty-something with an MFA in Creative Writing and a teaching certificate. She dreams of becoming a renowned novelist with a three-book deal and a summer house in Ghent. Reality check: she’s a rookie second-grade teacher about to experience the insanity of parent/teacher conferences for the first time! In each episode, Ms. Antler finds herself across the table from adults behaving like children, and slowly comes to realize it’s not her students who have problems, it’s their parents. The nine-episode first season of OPC, totaling thirty minutes, dropped September 22nd, 2017, and is streamable on YouTube and at www.opctheseries.com.
‘Other People’s Children’ checks all the boxes for my take on how to create a successful web series. Plus this: It’s funny!
I reached out to Anna and Brad about ‘Other People’s Children’. Here is that interview:
What was the inspiration for ‘Other People’s Children’?
As suburban parents with young children in the same school district, we began to notice how eccentric and volatile some parents can be when it comes to the education of their children. It also became clear to us that the school as an institution can become a political instrument for parents. So, parent/teacher conferences seemed like the obvious setting for exploring crazy parent issues and celebrating the frustrated teachers who educate us — and our kids.
Why a web series instead of writing a half-hour TV pilot script?
That’s a great question. As feature writers without a strong TV pedigree, it seemed like a good idea to develop a proof-of-concept web series to pair with our pilot, so that people could more clearly see the tone, the style, and the potential of the idea in funny little bites. We’re hoping the web series will speak to our ability to develop a half-hour show, and will allow potential buyers to dive into the world and characters even faster. I’m not sure this is something we would have done five years ago, but with the recent track record of web series moving into development deals, and the relatively low cost of production, it seemed like a reasonable gamble. Plus, it’s been a whole lot of fun getting the series made and onto the internet.
What was the writing process like and how long did it take you to go from story idea to completed scripts?
We brainstormed series ideas for a week or two, and then settled on OPC. For at least a month or so we sat and talked about characters, format, structure, and style — then honed in on the specific issues we wanted to address in each episode. After we had a list of episode concepts, we met over the course of two weeks and beat out the scenes in outline form — sometimes improvising the parts, arguing and shouting and cracking each other up. After we had a solid concept for each episode, we split them up and wrote first drafts on our own, then traded them back and forth — sometimes in person, sometimes over email — revising and punching until we felt they were close to locked. So, all told, we probably worked on the scripts for five months — among our other commitments. Casting really helped us to refine character voices and punch up the dialogue right before we began production.
You both teach screenwriting at the DePaul University School of Cinematic Arts and that association proved helpful in terms of bringing the series to fruition. Could you describe the nature of the university’s support for ‘Other People’s Children’?
About half the budget came from two DePaul grants, and the gear came from the school as well, so we could never have done the show at the level of production value we achieved without the support of the university. The crew were nearly all DePaul faculty, staff, students, or alumni, and their commitment and talent made all of the difference. Almost everyone worked for free, all for dozens and dozens of hours, and for that we will be forever grateful. We wrote the script, spent money, and made a lot of decisions, but without the talent and experience of our collaborators, we wouldn’t have this show.
What was the production process like? Any juicy anecdotes from production?
We struggled to lock our location. As it turns out, elementary schools are not so easy to rent during the school year, and we were scrambling up to a week before the shoot. Ultimately, we shot in the suburban district where our kids go to school, and they were spectacular to us. The drive from the city to the burbs cost us more time and money than we would have liked, and one day we got hammered with eight inches of snow and our truck got stuck on the playground, but all in all, we came through it clean, had a great time, and the food was great (and cheap)…because we cooked every meal ourselves! I smoked fifty pounds of pork just for one meal!
How did you find producing a web series in Chicago?
Chicago is a great town for production. The talent base is incredible — especially for comedy — the crew depth is deep, and the skill level is very high. The Chicagoland area is very welcoming to production, and people are generally eager to be part of your shoot and help you over hurdles. All things being equal, shooting this series anywhere else would have not yielded a better project, and in many ways, it may have hurt us. We’re proud to call OPC a Chicago production.
The series launched recently online. What’s been the response?
The response has been fantastic. To date, we’ve been accepted to seven web fests around the world, and have been nominated for a number of major awards. At the Rio Web Fest, which is the World Cup of Web Series final round, we were nominated for best comedy, best comedy writing, and best international series. At the International Online WebFest, we’ve been nominated for Best Series, Best Screenplay, and Best Actress — for our amazingly talented leading lady, Atra Asdou. The show has also been named a weekly staff pick on the web series sites Stareable.com, NetTVnow.com, and StarryMag.com. So, it’s going great thus far, and there are many more opportunities in the works.
Having been to several festivals, you’ve probably got a sense of the state of web series world out there. What’s your general impression of the current state of web series?
There are dozens of great web fests out there now, all over the world, and more come online every month. There are so many, in fact, that it’s hard for us to keep and apply to them all! These festivals give content creators a chance to see other work, meet other filmmakers, speak with distributors and executives, and learn new ideas and techniques that can help them develop future projects. At Stareable.com, creators can have their series included with over 3,000 other shows and become part of a growing online community of web series creators. People are turning to this format in droves, and we expect the venues for exhibition and peer review will only continue to expand.
What are your plans for ‘Other People’s Children’ and might we see more webisodes?
We’d like to do another season. If we do, we’d like to expand deeper into our protagonist’s life outside the classroom, and push the scope wider into a broad workplace comedy. Ideally, we’d like to find a partner or sponsor to help us fund production, but for now, we’re going to focus on getting our half-hour pilot and show bible shaped up as we continue to grow the audience for the web series.
Finally, what advice might you have for readers who are considering producing a web series?
It’s really important to know your audience before you commit to production, and to develop a plan for social media, publicity, and outreach to be implemented before, during, and after production. We think some of the best web series online are highly targeted, even niche, and the ones that succeed figure out how best to suck in viewers and build excitement in all phases of the project’s life. There are certainly things we’d do differently, and we’ve been learning on the fly in many ways, so if there is a next time for us, we expect to spend a lot more time thinking about marketing, PR, and social media strategies. A great show can easily get lost in the deep ocean of the internet if no one knows what it is and where to find it.
Here is Episode One of ‘Other People’s Children’:
Anna and Brad noted that several of their DePaul University School of Cinematic Art faculty colleagues were part of the crew for this project:
DP/Producer/Colorist — Brian Zahm
Post Production Supervisor and Editor — Savvas Paritsis
Editor — Ron Eltanal
Editor — Susanne Suffredin
Composer — Robert Steel
The project reflects one of the fantastic aspects of the undergraduate and graduate school experience at DePaul: Its DIY spirit. Between the talent at the school and in the city, the top shelf gear readily available to students and faculty, three soundstages the university rents at Cinespace Chicago Film Studios, there is a whole lotta creativity going on, witness the web series ‘Other People’s Children’.
For information on the series and to watch all 9 videos, here are some links:
Website: ‘Other People’s Children’
Check out Anna and Brad on a recent episode of the Hollywood Chicago podcast.
Twitter: @bradriddell, @AnnaHozian, @DePaulCinema.
