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Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 16 May 2013 07:44:35 -0400

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling comedians talk origins with professional creators and others just starting out, and hopefully answer their parents’ question, “What are you doing?”

On today’s show, we talk to writer and director Mitch Magee. With a background in visual art, Mitch makes comedic videos and short films with a very unique aesthetic. His works have been part of the New York Television Festival, Channel 101, and HBO’s Funny or Die Presents, and he’s directed videos for websites like College Humor and Funny or Die. His short film “Thank You, Cabbage” is now in pre-production.

A few weeks ago, Mitch came over to Andy’s old Harlem apartment to talk about a wide range of things including: Roco and rococo, hot air balloons, New Hollywood, WTF, control issues and emotional repression, creating with constraints, privilege, as well as parents and creating your life in reaction to them.

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Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 09 May 2013 13:07:43 -0400

On this episode of Beginnings: Field Guide, we talk about casting with Katja Blichfeld. For beginning – and even seasoned – actors, the world of casting can seem incredibly random and opaque. To walk us through the ways in which casting contributes to the creative process of a project, we talked with Katja, who has cast a number of features and shows, including The Carrie Diaries, as well as the entire run of 30 Rock.

As well as the ins and outs of casting, Katja shares with us some stories from the early days of 30 Rock, we chat about the possibility of non-cynical networking, plus there’s movie talk with the gang as we hit up Rocky, The Shining and Whore’s Glory; and Mark and Andy discuss their humiliating commercial auditions in the wrap-up!

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On next week’s Beginnings episode we talk to comedian and...

Wed, 08 May 2013 12:45:52 -0400

On next week’s Beginnings episode we talk to comedian and filmmaker Mitch Magee. He’s one of my (Andy’s) favorite guys making videos these days, and someone that taught me that you could make comedy videos that also have a unique style and aren’t just shot/reverse shots of dialogue.

Before the episode goes up, however, check out and donate to his Kickstarter campaign for a short film he’s trying to make. We talk about it in the episode, but suffice it to say this is no Zach Braff sitch. He could genuinely use the help, and I really can’t think of a better creative cause to donate to.

A clip from our April 2013 show. Savoir Adore plays part of...

Tue, 07 May 2013 11:26:22 -0400

A clip from our April 2013 show. Savoir Adore plays part of their brilliant song “Dreamers”.

Come see Beginnings live TONIGHT at 8pm. It’s the 100th episode and our guests are:

Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers),
J.J. Sedelmaier (TV Funhouse, Beavis and Butthead),
indie rock greats Parquet Courts
and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey Records, ex-Parts & Labor)

http://east.ucbtheatre.com/shows/view/2985

A clip from our April 2013 show. Andy learns a lesson in Judaism...

Fri, 03 May 2013 10:03:00 -0400

A clip from our April 2013 show. Andy learns a lesson in Judaism from actor and director Alex Karpovsky (HBO’s Girls).

Come see Beginnings live in May on Tuesday the 7th at 8pm. It’s the 100th episode and our guests are:

Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers),
J.J. Sedelmaier (TV Funhouse, Beavis and Butthead),
indie rock greats Parquet Courts
and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey Records, ex-Parts & Labor)

http://east.ucbtheatre.com/shows/view/2985

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 02 May 2013 10:12:23 -0400

On today’s show, we talk to cartoonist Bill Griffith. Bill began his comics career in the late 1960s in New York before eventually heading out west to San Francisco to be part of the burgeoning underground comics scene in the 1970s, where he co-founded the comics anthology Arcade with Art Spiegelman. Around this time, Griffith also created his brilliant daily strip Zippy the Pinhead, which runs today in over 100 newspapers and has been compiled in numerous collections.

Earlier this month while in town for the MoCCA indie comics festival, Bill stopped by Andy’s apartment in Harlem to discuss America as a nation of losers, the guilt and paranoia of influence, the Beat poets and Greenwich Village in the ’50s and ’60s, growing up in Levittown, having parents that lived through the depression and WWII, and the failed Zippy film.

Also, check out our 100th episode live in May at UCB East on the 7th with Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers), J.J. Sedelmaier (TV Funhouse), indie rock band Parquet Courts and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey) + more! In the meantime, subscribe on iTunes and leave a review. And why not follow Andy and Mark on Twitter?

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A clip from our April 2013 show. Andy plays some music he...

Wed, 01 May 2013 11:14:01 -0400

A clip from our April 2013 show. Andy plays some music he composed for the new Entourage film.

Come see Beginnings live in May on Tuesday the 7th at 8pm. It’s the 100th episode and our guests are:

Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers),
J.J. Sedelmaier (TV Funhouse, Beavis and Butthead),
indie rock greats Parquet Courts
and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey Records, ex-Parts & Labor)

Yay!

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 09:36:00 -0400

Welcome to MoCCA Week on Beginnings! At the start of April, the Society of Illustrators helped us put together a live episode of the show at the annual Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art (MoCCA) Festival, a convention in New York dedicated to indie comics, illustration and animation. We invited some of our favorite comics people on the show (Gabrielle Bell, Lisa Hanawalt), and even had some surprise drop ins (Kate Beaton, another favorite!), and generally had a blast. Plus, at the end of the episode, we sit down with animator Bill Plympton for a short discussion about his origins. Big thanks to the Society for welcoming us into the festival and a big thanks to all our guests! Stay tuned for Thursday’s episode with Zippy the Pinhead creator Bill Griffith.

Also, check out our 100th episode live in May at UCB East on the 7th with Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers), J.J. Sedelmaier (TV Funhouse), indie rock band Parquet Courts and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey) + more! In the meantime, subscribe on iTunes and leave a review. And why not follow Andy and Mark on Twitter?

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This is a video I (Andy) made in January as part of the Internot...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 11:24:51 -0400

This is a video I (Andy) made in January as part of the Internot Film Festival, a quarterly film night that Mark co-founded. The point of Internot is to make shorts that will be shown that night and won’t be available online for at least three months. It honestly makes creating a video feel more special and the viewing was a real success. If you’re a filmmaker, I’d recommend checking them out and submitting something.

andybeckerman:

This is a documentary about the noted academic and activist Sand Korski that I made for the very first Internot Film Festival back in January.

written and directed by Andy Beckerman
Starring Katie Hartman and Corey Brown
Featuring Naomi Ekperigin

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 09:00:00 -0400

On today’s show, we talk to filmmaker and producer Michael Gottwald. Michael graduated from Wesleyan University in 2006 and went to work on a number of film and video projects - including producing Big Freedia’s video for “Y’All Get Back Now” - before beginning production on the film Beasts of the Southern Wild with writer and director Benh Zeitlin. Since it’s debut last year, Beasts has racked up a number of accolades including the Caméra d’Or award at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, the Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, and four Academy Award nominations at this year’s Oscars.

A couple weeks ago, Michael stopped by Andy’s apartment in Harlem to chat with the lads. We eulogize Roger Ebert, talk about going back to visit your high school, learn about attending the Oscars, discuss the pathology of indecisiveness, and get a visit from Andy’s weird landlord!

Check out our 100th episode live in May at UCB East on the 7th with Sam Seder (Majority Report, Bob’s Burgers), indie rock band Parquet Courts and musical guest Dan Friel (Thrill Jockey) + more! In the meantime, subscribe on iTunes and leave a review. And why not follow Andy and Mark on Twitter?

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Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 09:30:25 -0400

On today’s show, we talk to actress and comedian Aisha Tyler. Starting stand-up in the early 1990s in San Francisco, Aisha’s first break in TV came in 2001 when she began hosting Talk Soup. Since then, she’s kept incredibly busy with roles on shows like Friends and Ghost Whisperer, and as Lana Kane on FX’s Archer, as well as co-hosting CBS’s The Talk and hosting her own hit podcast Girl on Guy. In addition to all of this, this year her second book Self-Inflicted Wounds will be released and later this summer, she’ll take over as host of Whose Line Is It Anyway?

A few weeks ago, while Aisha was in town for an Archer live show, we stopped by her hotel room to discuss putting your time in and doing the work, childhood knowledge of genocide, what it’s like to grow up with artistic-minded parents, and of course clone sex.

Check out our 100th episode live in May at UCB East on the 7th with some of the members of indie rock group Parquet Courts and more! In the meantime, subscribe on iTunes and leave a review. And why not follow Andy and Mark on Twitter?

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On the second Tuesday of every month at UCB East, two fledgling...

Thu, 11 Apr 2013 10:00:27 -0400

On the second Tuesday of every month at UCB East, two fledgling comedians talk origins with professional creators, and hopefully answer their parents’ question, “What are you doing?” This is Beginnings: Live!

I know that a large portion of the listening audience doesn’t live in New York, but holy heck are these live shows a lot of fun. And this recording still retains a guaranteed 75-85% of that fun, so please enjoy how great Jessi Klein (head writer of Inside Amy Schumer), Alex Karpovsky (Girls), Jake & Amir (College Humor) and our musical guest Savoir Adore were last Tuesday at the esteemed UCB East Theatre!

We’ll probably have a live show in May so look out for that, and in the meantime subscribe on iTunes and leave a review. And why not follow Andy and Mark on Twitter and laff it up!®

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Mark and Andy made this pilot last year. It’s about...

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 14:40:00 -0400

Mark and Andy made this pilot last year. It’s about warring snack companies in America’s Snack Belt. It was a finalist in the NYTVF/Comedy Central Pilot Competition. It stars Henry Zebrowski, Joe Stanton, Kelly Hudson, Ken Beck, Langan Kingsley, Will Storie, Henry Kaiser, Julia Wiedeman, Will Cooper & Greggory Daniels. It’s fun.

Hi pals! This came together a bit late in the week, but if...

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 23:55:00 -0400

Hi pals! This came together a bit late in the week, but if you’re going to be at the MoCCA Arts Fest this weekend, we’re doing a live Beginnings on Saturday, April 6th at 1:15 in the Moving Image Lounge off the main floor with wonderful comics creators Gabrielle Bell, Dash Shaw and Lisa Hanawalt. Maybe you remember Gabrielle from her delightful interview last summer?

MoCCA Fest looks super-exciting, and we’ve already done an amazing interview with Zippy the Pinhead creator Bill Griffith. Look for that in a few weeks!

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 12:10:00 -0400

On today’s show, we talk to writer and artist Nicholas Gurewitch. Nick began writing and drawing his comic The Perry Bible Fellowship in his college paper, and since then, the comic has appeared in a number of newspapers and magazines and was released in two anthologies by Dark Horse Comics. Nick has also won some of the top awards in comics for The Perry Bible Fellowship including the Ignatz Award, the Harvey Award and the Eisner Award.

A few weeks ago, while accidentally in town for a canceled meeting, Nick stopped by the Wrestling Team apartment to discuss Disney and classical music, memory and creativity, and transcendence and religion.

Subscribe on iTunes and follow Andy and Mark on Twitter!

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Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 09:53:21 -0400

On today’s show we talk to artist Steve Keene. Based in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Steve has been called the “Assembly-Line Picasso” by Time Magazine because of his unique mass-production painting style. Steve likens this method to the way musicians work, and he’s painted the album art for many indie rock bands, including Pavement, The Apples in Stereo, The Silver Jews and many others.

A few weeks ago, we met up with Steve at his studio space and got in deep about painting as performance, the satisfaction of doing actual labor and taking your inspiration from musicians. We also got to see his workspace up close and get a real feel for how he makes art. It was a treat!

Subscribe on iTunes and follow Andy and Mark on Twitter! See a live episode on April 2nd at UCB East at 8pm with comedian Jessi Klein, Jake and Amir of College Humor, Alex Karpovsky from Girls and music from Savoir Adore!

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Beginnings: Live! Tuesday, March 2 8:00pm UCBEast(153 East 3rd...

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 14:42:47 -0400

Beginnings: Live!
Tuesday, March 2
8:00pm
UCBEast
(153 East 3rd St. @ Ave. A)
w/ Jessi Klein
Alex Karpovsky
Jake & Amir
& musical guest
Savoir Adore

Where do creative people come from? On Beginnings, two fledgling...

Thu, 21 Mar 2013 06:52:00 -0400

On today’s show, we talk to UK comedian Lou Sanders. Based in London, Lou has been performing stand-up for many years, with a number of appearances at the Edinburgh Fringe, where she had one of the top 10 jokes of the 2012 Festival. She also writes for TV and has worked on two series of C4’s Stand up for the Week, as well as BBC3’s Laughtershock & a number of pilots.

A few weeks ago, while she was in town for a few days doing shows, Lou stopped by the Wrestling Team apartment to have the most sincere recorded conversation ever. We talk about divorce, meditation, adult wants, and we debut our new CREEPIEST segment ever!

Subscribe on iTunes and follow Andy and Mark on Twitter! See a live episode on April 2nd at UCB East at 8pm comedian Jessi Klein, Jake and Amir of College Humor and Alex Karpovsky (Girls)

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On the second Tuesday of every month at UCB East, two fledgling...

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 08:22:00 -0400

On the second Tuesday of every month at UCB East, two fledgling comedians talk origins with professional creators, and hopefully answer their parents’ question, “What are you doing?” This is Beginnings: Live!

Ka-zoink! My eyes just popped outta my head like a cartoon character thanks to this last live show at UCB East. We had a weird blast, and now you can join in on the fun we had with author and bon-vivant Dave Hill, Abbi and Ilana of the newly-announced Comedy Central show Broad City and Catherine and Amy of the band Hilly Eye. Not even a missing middle of the show can take away from our charming guests!

Subscribe on iTunes and follow Andy and Mark on Twitter! See a live episode on April 2nd at UCB East at 8pm comedian Jessi Klein, Jake and Amir of College Humor and more!

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Matt Fisher - former Beginnings guest and director of our...

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 12:30:00 -0500

Matt Fisher - former Beginnings guest and director of our musical Rockefeller Centaur - is one of the nicest and funniest people we know. He recently began a holiday in memory of his sister Katie called Katie Fisher Day, which will be on this Tuesday the 12th. Katie was killed in a car accident a few years ago (you may have heard about it through Matt’s family’s problems with noted corporate shitheads Progressive), and March 12th is her birthday. She used to send Matt cookies weekly while he was at college so, in the website’s words, “…in an attempt to honor her memory and to show each other some measure of the love that Katie showed to us, we’ve decided to try and encourage people to be a little bit more wonderful to each other.”

I hope you’ll participate! Naomi and I (Andy) will be making cookies for our parents and my sister. You should make cookies for someone you love too! Matt’s a fantastic guy, and we support him wholeheartedly!