May 23, 2003

• Note: all times are now Sydney time

  Back in Sydney!

  We arrived at 6am; dumped our piles of luggage at home and here we are (8am) checking our email at the studio as the sun rises on a very peaceful, quiet Saturday morning.

  Before we left L.A. we had lunch with the in-house Mucha Lucha crew, said our goodbyes and promised to be back. What with an extended 2nd season of 26 episodes this year (followed by another 13, and a Direct-to-video movie), there is much WORK to be done and we want to be part of the action!

  

  group pic taken in the WB Animation Lobby

  Mucha Lucha CREW from L to R (standing): Pam Palma/Flash artist, Katrien Verbiest/BG design, Annette Huckell/Flash librarian, Michael Diaz/Creative Exec, Roman Laney/BG design, Ron Brewer/Storyboard Supervisor, Ricky Garduno/Storyboard artist, Tim Yoon/Prod. Manager, Dominic Bianchi/Prod. Coordinator (almost hidden), Greg Colton/Storyboard artist, Ken Kessel/Creative Producer, Garth House/Prod. Coordinator, Ira Sherak/Storyboard artist (half seated), Eric Waldman/Prod. Coordinator

  From L to R (seated): Peter Hastings/Story editor (with glass vase), me, Joel Kuwahara/Line Producer (on the ground), Eddie, Tony Mora/Flash artist.

  

  With Carlos Alazraqui (voice of Rikochet)

  After yesterday’s voice recording, Carlos showed us a pilot of Comedy Central’s forthcoming “Reno 911!” series (a cop show parody in which he stars as Officer Garcia). It’s HILARIOUS. Really!

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  On the possibility of relocating to L.A…

   

  L.A. is really the global hub of TV animation. Sure, there is a lot happening in Australia, Europe etc. But we have met SO MANY talented people here. There are so many animation studios, and so many properties in development… plenty of inspiration to keep creating and pitching new stuff while we work on ML with WB Animation; and Cosmic Baby with Cartoon Network Asia-Pacific.

  In terms of Lucha Libre/Masked Wrestling culture, L.A. is also calling to us. There are matches every alternate week somewhere in SoCal. There’s Lucha Va Voom next month (which we’ll sadly miss again). There is Revolution Pro and TJ 3 hours away…

   

  

   

   

   

   Rotunda buildling (with the 7 dwarves) and street sign from Disney studios;

  Sponge Bob on top of the Nickelodeon building 

  The big question is: WILL WE RELOCATE? WHEN WILL WE RELOCATE? (Fwak! Animation will continue, of course) ML production will continue through 2004; we have 3-year US work visas. We are always grappling with the travel bug and thinking about a change of scene…

  And so, back in Sydney, our URGENT LIST of things to do in the next few months, the sooner the better:

  • Complete our Cosmic Baby pilot (recasting, recording, animation, post, sound, deliver, everything…)
  • Renew passports and resident visas (before we travel again)
  • Trip to Melbourne to visit Eddie’s family
  • Finalize ML Publicity artwork for WB Marketing
  • Commence discussion with WB Online re: designing the ML wrestling game
  • Start working on new ideas – new bibles
  • Animation on Eddie’s Santito project.
  • Lili takes a crash course in driving (on the ‘wrong’ side of the road)
  • Get haircuts
  • Move out of our apartment…

  • 8:08 pm
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