He smiled nervously at the parking attendant, placing his driver’s license into the man’s outstretched hand. A few minutes later, the card was returned along with two thick squares of paper.
“Here’s your visitor’s pass, plus one for your vehicle. Welcome to FOX!”
Aaron drove carefully through the crowded parking garage and checked his watch; he didn’t want to be late. The Galaxy Lot was an enormous facility which housed the vehicles of all current visitors to the FOX studio headquarters as well as those of many staff members. Row after row of spaces marked RESERVED ticked by, and it wasn’t until reaching the bowels of the structure that an open space was finally procured.
He hurried out of the garage and followed the omnipresent signs through the twisted labyrinth of buildings which encompassed the Lot. Elaborate topiary masterpieces depicting penguins, elephants, and other improbable creatures dotted the landscape, standing in stark contrast to the roadways which were cluttered with vehicles and plywood. While there were plenty of pathways and sidewalks, it was difficult to distinguish them from the clusters of divergent trails leading off to dead ends or secret alleyways. Even with the help of his maps, Aaron was convinced he was going to wrong way until he saw a bright orange sign taped to a dowel.
FUTURAMA TABLE READ –>
Perfect! he thought, hurrying in the indicated direction. The arrows pointed directly down a long alley which was lined on either side with half-constructed sets, studio buildings, and moving trucks. Parking spaces had been carved into the edges wherever they would fit, all of them marked RESERVED. Men and women in matching uniforms were hauling equipment to and from the trucks, but none bothered him as he walked purposefully through the crowded carnage toward his destination.
He finally found the appropriate building, marked with another orange sign for clarity, and walked in. Several dozen people were milling around a breakfast bar, filling plates with chicken, donuts, fruit, and eggs while chatting about various industry happenings. A man walked up and handed Aaron a clipboard.
“Fill this out,” he smiled. “Have you done this before?”
Aaron shook his head, skimming the legal document and scribbling his name and date in the appropriate spaces.
“Well, you’re gonna love it!” the man said, still beaming unnaturally as he collected the clipboard and handed Aaron a thick packet of paper. “Here’s today’s script. Help yourself to the food and drinks, and take a seat somewhere in the adjoining room whenever you’re ready.”
“Should I…” Aaron began, but the man had already moved on to brandish his clipboard at another visitor.
He filled his plate with fruit and wandered into the other room, where he stopped cold. There was a large conference table dominating most of the space, while rows of couches lined every wall. Name plates were affixed to the table in varying colors, designating where different members of the staff would sit, but the outer rim seemed like fair game. Aaron found a seat away from the crowd – everyone else seemed to know people there – and quietly picked at his food.
Come on, Jake, he thought. Where are you?
Aaron had the privilege of attending this table read due to the kind invitation of a friend from college who now works on the show, and it was just beginning to occur to him that he wasn’t sure Jake was actually going to be coming. He finished his plate, and was just contemplating a refill when a familiar voice startled him.
“Good! You made it!”
Aaron glanced up at Jake and laughed, “I could say the same for you!”
“Come on, we’re sitting over there – better view of the cast.”
Twenty minutes ticked by as guests situated themselves around the room’s borders while the cast, writers, animators, and other dignitaries trickled in and took their seats one by one at the table. Eventually, a larger man seated at the center stood up and cupped his hands to his mouth like a megaphone.
“Alllllllright! Let’s get started!”
The room immediately went silent, and all eyes swooped toward the speaker: Matt Groening.
“Thank you all for coming today,” he said, obviously pleased. “I’d like to thank the Century 21 staff for the amazing breakfast.”
He paused as the room filled with applause, then cleared his throat. “And I’d like to welcome the writer of today’s script, a legend of our time, David X. Cohen!”
A smaller man with round glasses seated directly across from Matt stood up and waved before taking his seat again.
“I have only one announcement of my own to make,” David said, grinning. “And it’s THIS!”
Reaching under the table, David pulled forth the Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program they had just been awarded. The room dissolved into thunderous applause, which only quieted somewhat after David tucked the award back into its secret compartment under the table.
“Good work on that, everyone,” David continued. “I also wanted to recognize our very own Maurice LaMarche for the Emmy he received for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance.”
Applause once more filled the chamber, and a large man seated on the cast’s side of the table stood up and grinned.
“Like I said in my speech before, that award is for every single one of us…”
The rest of his sentence was drowned out by the other cast members, who interrupted with a chorus of “Yeah, yeah!” and “Brown noser!” using voices from the show. Maurice shrugged and sat back down, still grinning broadly.
“Now then, let’s get started,” David said, holding up his script packet. “At the risk of being accused of nepotism, I must disclose that today’s script was written entirely by my wife’s husband.” He paused just a beat for the snickers to die down, then flipped the packet open to the first page. “Act One…”
The process for a table read is remarkably straight-forward; if you’ve been to an English class, you’ve probably experienced something quite similar. A narrator reads all of the script, including stage directions, while various voice actors fill in the dialogue as it comes up. None of the readers had seen the script before, so the run-through had quite a few hilarious bumps and charming missteps.
While I cannot actually discuss the content of the script, I will say that John DiMaggio (Bender) was rendered helpless with laughter during one of his scenes, and kept repeating “A new low…a new low for Bender…” while fighting for breath and banging a fist upon the table. It was a good episode.
The room rapidly emptied after the table read ended. Visitors were allowed to keep the cover sheet of the script, but the actual packet had to be returned to the cheerful man with the clipboard who provided it earlier. A few of Jake’s other guests were going to visit the Futurama office, and Aaron decided to tag along to see a little more of the magic for himself.
They took a brief tour of the trailer which housed the writing and editing operations for the show and learned a few neat facts (the animation process takes 2-4 months per episode, voices are recorded at least 3 different times, and episodes on FOX are longer than ones on Comedy Central, for example) but one of the most interesting things there had nothing to do with animation. Two of the staff members had, over the course of many lunch breaks, constructed a 3D printer which could carve anything you told it to out of plastic. Of course, the process of “telling it” to carve something involved creating a complicated program for the printer, so its current library was limited to making small whistles. Still, if you don’t think it’s impressive to watch an ordinary desktop printer physically fabricate an object for you, I don’t think you appreciate good things.
All too soon, Aaron found himself driving out of the Galaxy Lot and heading for home. He smiled as he hummed the Futurama theme song and glanced down at the script’s cover sheet, now signed by Matt and David. Thanks again, Jake, he grinned. That was a pretty cool birthday present.
Mistopia: Post-Collegiate America 