Speaker 0 00:00:00 Hi all. Welcome to the Cosmic Cafe, the companion podcast to the cosmic circus.com. I'm ala Ruby and we have a very, very special interview for you today. Um, for all of you Star Trek fans. I'm sure you've been watching Strange New Worlds, and we have Jordan Canning who directed, um, one of the most recent episodes of Strange New Worlds. Alright, so here's the interview. Enjoy.
Speaker 2 00:00:34 So first, it's wonderful to meet you. Um, thank you. I'm, I'm Myla Ruby. Uh, so this episode was amazing. It was like so funny and just had a lot of heart and some really deep things. So I just wanted to give you like a kudos at the beginning 'cause like, thank
Speaker 3 00:00:47 You.
Speaker 2 00:00:48 It's amazing. Um, so I wanna talk about a little bit your journey to Star Trek. 'cause you have this really impressive career, like you've done, um, shit's Creek, which is hilarious. You've done Fraggle Rock. Um, but on your Facebook you also say like you're a huge Star Trek fan. Can you talk about how, like, how you got to be on Star Trek's Strange New Worlds?
Speaker 3 00:01:08 Yeah. I mean, I, I I was a big Next-Gen kid fan and a big Voyage Home fan. You know, I, I think I always gravitated towards the more comedic, I mean mm-hmm. <affirmative>, star Trek four to me, I probably watched 20 times <laugh>, you know, it's, it's my sweet spot. Um, and you know, over the years, like I, one of the first kind of bigger projects I did, uh, 10 years ago now, was a, was a sci-fi comedy. It was called, it was a web series called Space Riders Division Earth. And it was sort of like a Power Rangers mm-hmm. <affirmative> kind of spoof, uh, with some amazing comedic actors in it. And, you know, really rough around the edges, but so fun. And I, I've always loved mixed genres. I loved, I love, you know, sci-fi comedies, galaxy Quest is like one of my favorite movies.
Speaker 3 00:01:58 <laugh>, I love, you know, horror comedies that I think anything where I can inject some comedy into a kind of high concept genre is really where I love to, to work. 'cause I love world building. I love big, you know, I love sets and, you know, weird fantasy type stuff with a great, with great heart and great comedy underneath it. So this was really a sweet spot for me. I mean, this episode in particular, but strange new worlds in general, like mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I've just, I've loved this show so much, you know, that I got to watch the first season before it came out and just got, so I was just soci. I was like, oh my God, this show is really good. Like, it's really good. The writing is great. The cast is amazing. They're doing some really amazing stuff with tone. You know, I, I think more so than any of the Star Treks, they, they seamlessly move between tones from episode to episode and not in a way where it's, you know, feels disjointed or you're like, I don't get, what, what do you mean?
Speaker 3 00:03:05 Suddenly this is a comedy or suddenly this is a horror movie. It always feels grounded in the, in the world and the reality of the show. Um, and it's really a, it's a hard thing to do and not a lot of shows can do it at all, um, without it feeling hokey or gimmicky. And they do it brilliantly. And I think part of that is because of the amazing flexibility of the cast. Like mm-hmm. <affirmative>, the casting on this show is top, top, top, top drawer <laugh>, and they're all so versatile, you know? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you think about e what Ethan did in this episode, when you think about Spock, <laugh>, like what I, I love what he's done with Spock in general. Like, I, I loved him in season one. I loved him in, in, in season two of Discovery. I was like, oh, this guy's great. Um, and so then to get to see him, like, you know, loosen his tie mm-hmm. <affirmative> and really let loose and show just how, uh, how amazing he can be with comedy and, and some romance. Uh, it was so, it was so fun to, to get, to play in this world and to get to play in a comedic tone in this world.
Speaker 2 00:04:10 I think this episode has been inspired like a thousand memes just based on, oh my goodness, you know, the, the cast and how incredible they, they were at bringing this to life.
Speaker 3 00:04:18 I can't, I gotta see these memes. I can't wait to see them. Yeah. <laugh>.
Speaker 2 00:04:21 Um, so like, what was your first reaction on reading this script for charades? Because, um, like how did you, how did you know you wanted this one? Well,
Speaker 3 00:04:30 I, what's, what's so cool about this show is they really work to pair directors with the scripts that they think will kind of be a good fit. So even before I read the script, um, Chris Fisher, uh, the producing director had sort of given me the spiel of like, okay, you're, it's a Spock episode, uh, he's gonna go fully human and his in-laws are coming in. Everybody on the ship is sort of a comedy of errors. Everybody has to sort of help him pull it off. And even just at the little log line, I was like, oh, yes, this, I love it. He didn't even tell me. It ended with a big smooch. Like, you know, that was just a cherry on top <laugh>. Um, so I was already primed, like very excited. And so then when I got the script, I mean, the script was so good, you know, it, it changed a little bit.
Speaker 3 00:05:20 I think we simplified some things, but really the heart of it and the, the kind of tone of it was always so clear and, and, and well, well developed right on the page. You know, Catherine and Henry did an amazing job with this, with this script. Like the humor was there, the romance was there, the heart was there. Um, the stakes, you know, the kind of fun dek out stakes of like, oh, we're going on this big adventure to this moon, and like, no, this is actually a bottle episode about, uh, Fox in-laws coming over for dinner. So I just loved it. I, I, it's when you get a script in TV that you really connect to and really can sort of just, it just comes very organically. I was like reading and I was like, okay, I know how I'm gonna do this. I know I'm gonna do that. Oh, this is gonna be fun. There weren't any moments in the script where I was like, oh, okay. Hmm. How are we gonna make this work? They all worked Right, right on the page.
Speaker 2 00:06:16 Was there anything that was really like your favorite to film or that really, um, you know, challenged you as a director when you got into it? Because like, there's this cool ar wall and just like, there's so much interesting stuff.
Speaker 3 00:06:27 Yeah, the ar wall was so fun. It was so cool to, you know, to basically like, get to play in the Halleck for a day. Um, uh, it's funny, like, I really love, I really love some of the quote unquote, like, simpler scenes like the two handers with Ethan and Jess. Like, I love the scene in the bathroom. I love the scene, I love the kiss at the end. I love that <laugh>, you know, the, the, those sort of just really bare character scenes I think are beautiful. Um, and very so sad. They're the ones I like wanna watch over and over again. Um, but I'm also, I'm very proud of the very, I think there's four montages in this mm-hmm. Uh, in this episode, which is definitely more montages than I've ever done, ever. Um, and I'm, I'm quite proud of how they all came together in terms of them each having their, so their, their own sort of visual style.
Speaker 3 00:07:23 And you know how the two in the middle, the vol Vulcan Spock versus Human Spock, how they mirror one another. Um, and then I love, I love when everybody's sort of getting on board. All the crew members are sort of digging in and, and helping out and sort of standing in for the parents and trying to teach 'em how to speak Vulcan. I just love those moments where everybody kind of gets a little, just a, you know, everybody gets a funny line or a little look and yeah. I, I, I'm, yeah, I was blessed with a great script and an amazing cast, so very lucky.
Speaker 2 00:07:56 I, I think we're just about at time, but, um, was there, so is there anything that you can share that you're working on next? Is there more Star Trek in your future? No, everybody's
Speaker 3 00:08:04 On strike. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:08:05 That's true.
Speaker 3 00:08:06 Yeah. I think the, you know, the streamers and studios need to pay up and then we can all get back to work, but, um, no, I'm, I'm on summer vacation right now, so.
Speaker 2 00:08:16 All right. Perfect. Well, thank you so much.
Speaker 3 00:08:18 Yeah. Thank you. Nice to meet you.
Speaker 2 00:08:20 Nice to meet you. Thank you for listening. You can find the companion article for this podcast, along with all the other news for those who like superheroes, science fiction and fantasy films, TV shows, and other
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