most innovative TV shows

February 5, 2021

Initially a cartoon writer and animator, Paul Dini — cousin of Headmaster David Dini — branched out into television and film screenwriting, impacting several well-known franchises.

WORLDWIDE Starting with his first two series with “Filmation” in 1979, Paul Dini wrote or produced over 60 films and shows over his career. Despite changing technology and media, his style retains elements from his older works.

Will Pechersky: When did you first gain an interest in writing, creating and producing? Paul Dini: It was all when I was a kid. I would write humorous stories at school instead of handing in a basic report. I would illustrate it with little drawings or I’d try and make it funny. I read a lot when I was a kid. I read a lot of humor books and I read a lot of short stories, and I was thinking like, ‘Boy, I hope there’s some way I could turn this into a job,’ and I really didn’t have any sort of career path mapped out. I went through college having no idea at all what I was going to do. I arrived out here in Los Angeles around 1980 and worked from one place to another. I guess I knew the business well enough, and I knew the craft of creating and writing and mapping out cartoons. That led to producing on animated shows, and it led to writing other types of shows. I guess it came down to being a fast study at whatever I was learning and having a lot of enthusiasm for different types of television.

WP: Are there any lessons that you’ve learned through experiencing different challenges as a creator? PD: I would say to not limit yourself to one sort of Paul Dini Screenthing. If you like sitcoms, writer read all about them, watch as many as you can, try and experiment and write in that form if you want to. Do not limit yourself to what somebody else has done and do not do a copy of what they’ve done. Find something about that relationship of the lead characters that you like and look for a way to apply it to your own life. It’s the same with animation, don’t try and redo what Bob Clampett or Chuck Jones or Hanna-Barbera did years before, because that stuff exists as their work. I’ve seen a lot of of artists and directors that come up saying, ‘I’m going to do just a zany and cartoonist Bob Clampett or Tex Avery,’ and I’m going like, ‘They did the wacky, the eye pops, the crazy sound effects and the weird reactions. What can you do? How do you make this funny? What’s your definition of funny? If you try and imitate what they’re doing, you’re never going to be able to put an original spin on it. Make something of your own experience and then figure out a way to tell that story as a cartoon. Then you’ll be happier and also have a more unique type of picture.

WP: Which of your contributions would you say you’re most proud of? PD: When I worked on a Batman series and the Warner Brothers cartoons I did over the 15 years I was there, I had a really good experience working with various artists and teams to come up with something new and fun and put a new spin on things like Batman. Nobody had really done an action-adventure series like that before, and that came from really thinking about the character and his world and the whole history of Batman. We looked at it in a way to distill that all down into something that we felt was new and unique, yet still felt like it spoke to the heart of the character. So the fact that it’s been almost like 30 years since the show premiered, people are still enjoying it, they’re still watching it and it has an air of timelessness to it. I feel good about being associated with that. That was definitely a career highlight. So to be part of that was a lot of fun and very gratifying.

WP: What is your creative process like? Do you write for TV shows on superheroes differently from writing other types of TV? GA: It has to begin with character, or you don’t have much of a story. I write on a show also called “Creep Show” which was on Shutter. It’s a horror anthology based on the movie from the ‘80s. So, again, it’s like “Tales from the Crypt” or “Twilight Zone” or something like that, where they’re all oneshot stories, and I work with a writing partner on those. We’ll sit down at the start of each season and we’ll go ‘What’s horrific in our life, what motivates us, what keeps us up at night, what are we sort of outraged by what we see somebody else doing and how does that emerge into the realm of monsters?’ Very rarely will we come up with a monster, and they’ll make it look really cool when they design and construct it, but if it’s not evocative of a human condition or it doesn’t mean something in a bigger story, then it’s just a guy in a big suit running around.

WP: How has animation changed in the time that you’ve been in the industry? What’s been the effect of the new technology in that time? PD: I’d say that the rise of computers has made animation in many ways a lot more cost effective. When I started in the early 80s, it was all handdrawn animation. It was all based on the format pioneered by the Disney studio, Warner Brothers and Hanna Barbera, but it was all stripped down to be really cheap and efficient. So that was what was really frustrating is for a long time; myself and other artists and writers were feeling like we were being hamstrung, like we couldn’t do our best, like we had to sort of strive for this middle of the road mediocrity where none of it really meant much of anything.

WP: Do you have to force yourself to keep coming up with new ideas or does inspiration come naturally to you? PD: Well, I’m pretty lucky in that I have a natural love for the types of work I do. I think if I didn’t enjoy it, I would have a lot more trouble coming up with ideas for it because other people have told me: ‘Well, why don’t you try writing for this show’ and it’s like, I don’t want to really write a police procedural. I‘ll watch one, but I don’t really want to write one because I don’t have the ideas for that. I can sit there for an hour and be entertained by something, but again I don’t really want to write it, whereas with animation I’m always intrigued by the possibilities and what you can show with it and the more bizarre stories you can tell.

STORY Will Pechersky, Alam Alidina PHOTOS Courtesy Paul Dini

INTERVIEW Myles Lowenberg

Junior James Singhal posts his photography on his Instagram account, @jsinghalphoto. He gives a look behind his photos here. I had a portraiture assignment, and I decided to try something slightly different. I wanted to try shooting in a studio setting, and I got my friend [junior] Enoch [Ellis] to help. I think it’s a bit cheesy to get him to have fake blood coming out of his mouth, but to set up something a bit different, we used an orange gel on one of the lights to create a warmer tone and just shot the photo. It turned out pretty nice, especially with the gradient in the background. I wanted to try product photography. I’d seen a couple photographers I follow had shot products, and I wanted to try shooting a bottle of makeup — I believe this was eyeshadow. I got a sheet of Plexiglas that was frosted on one side and poured some of the product out onto it.

I set up the lighting, and I was going for a really saturated look. And I kept adjusting it to get the lighting as perfect as I could to make the label glow. I believe I got a pretty cool result, although the pool on the bottom is a bit weird. I took this photo while trying to emulate Ansel Adams, and my main purpose here was to shoot a landscape without a wide angle lens and to try to use a telephoto lens to really capture the feeling and emotion of this mountain.

Since Ansel Adams always shot in black and white, I used that, and I think it really helps to capture the wild nature and the grit of the mountain. You can see snow blowing off the top of the mountain, and also the stark contrast from the sunlight. The heavy contrast and the sharp, jagged mountain really help to show the craziness of the world and nature.

Whether it’s virtual or in person, Stephen Houpt hasn’t missed a beat in getting his music out to the public.

He’s always played the blues.

Concerts, performances, crowds, all the trappings of live music.

Now, those concerts are impossible.

But that doesn’t stop physics instructor Stephen Houpt from making his music.

Though many around campus have been fortunate enough to hear physics instructor Stephen Houpt’s music live in assemblies, they can now enjoy his music online in the form of a blog. He began the website using a company called CD Baby that has a smaller branch called Host Baby which gave him a template to create a website.

“The most important thing about the website is that it actually has the music on it,” Houpt said. “The audio section has all of the seven albums that I have put together.”

Houpt often plays and records songs alongside people associated with 10600 Preston Road. One of Houpt’s blues albums released in 2019, called Strictly TaBlue, featured Fine Arts Chair Marion Glorioso on vocals. Houpt has also performed alongside senior guitarist Collin Katz and instrumentalist Chirag Gokani ‘17 respectively in the past.

“Ms. Glorioso was a great vocalist when we performed a while back and I remember playing alongside Chirag Gokani, like when we performed a live-gig outdoors,” Houpt said.

For Houpt, the online blog represents an easy way for people to access his music without having to go through a streaming service.

“The purpose of the website is to allow people the chance to listen to my music without having to stream it on Spotify or YouTube, even though the music is on there also,” Houpt said.

Additionally, the blog and other online avenues provide Houpt a way to release his music without inperson concerts – that Covid-19 has made impossible.

“I can’t play music in actual venues anymore,” Houpt said. “Therefore, I have been doing live concerts on Facebook and a couple Zoom concerts. I am doing these concerts along with the Dallas SongWriters Association.”

Houpt has been teaching physics virtually the entire year. However, despite the time saved by not having to commute, he has not had more time to put into his music.

“I have not had more time on my hands as a result of teaching virtually,” Houpt said. “Like all teachers, I spent the weekends grading and writing comments. One challenge I have had is doing labs. I sometimes have to go to St. Mark’s on the weekends and make demonstration videos to help the students the next week.”

Houpt often plays with an acoustic style guitar, the Lysenborn, and currently wants to make an all-instrumental album using various types of Lysenbornes. Specifically, Houpt wanted to play with a Baritone Lysenborn, and looked around the world for Luthiers, people who make guitars. Finally, he came across guitar maker Richard Wilson.

“Richard Wilson, who lives in Australia, wanted $4000 to make this guitar,” Houpt said. “He listened to my music and said he really liked it and offered to take $1350 off the price, if after he finished making it, I would make some videos and recordings for him.”

One of Houpt’s long-term goals has been to get a guitar sponsorship, and Wilson is essentially paying him to record music.

“It is my first endorsement deal, so I was pretty happy about that,” Houpt said. “He is going to take those recordings and put them on his website and social media. He makes beautiful guitars.”

STORY Cooper Ribman, Shreyan Daulat PHOTOS Courtesy Stephen Houpt

PERFORMING LIVE Houpt and the blues band Strictly TaBlue perform in front of a crowd at Poor David’s Pub while Houpt plays the harmonica, one of his favorite instruments, prior to the pandemic.

Used in the making of six of his albums available on Spotify and Apple Music, Houpt enjoys playing his Weissenborn acoustic lap steel guitar made in 1927.

From album drops to movie releases and everything in between, here’s what’s on tap in the coming weeks.

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February 5, 2021