An Interview with Blark and Son Creator Ben Bayouth
Ben Bayouth is a true puppet master. Not like that 1989 horror flick, Puppet Master, which featured puppets coming to life because of an Egyptian curse, or something? But, a master craftsman at creating and performing with puppets. His creations have appeared in movies, television, and those memorable Rick and Morty promotional videos.
As a puppeteer, Ben has done it all from music videos to box office films and was even a finalist on Jim Henson’s Creature Shop Challenge. But, his largest project to date has to be the Comedy Central series Blark and Son, a show about a hardened father trying to build a connection with his video game loving son. Ben took some time from the insane amount of work a puppeteer has to talk to us at Bubbleblabber about the long road it took to build Blark and Son.
Jesse Bereta: Hey Ben, thank you for taking the time to talk to us. I did get the chance to watch a few episodes and really enjoyed it, for sure. I did get to see the Instagram shorts from 2017. And, I really enjoyed those.
BB: Thank you. It’s been a really fun journey with the show. I enjoy making it thoroughly. So, I appreciate that.
JB: So, it started in 2017, and already you have a full season out with Comedy Central. And, you were with Verizon for a while. That must have been a massive challenge to do that over the span of a year or two?
BB: It was nine months. Nine months to make the Comedy Central YouTube show. You know, which is a tall order. It’s a little over 2 hours of content. And, all that appears in every single shot is an effects shot and doesn’t have any of the luxuries of shooting live-action. Or, typical live-action, I guess. It was a crazy journey.
JB: Fair enough. I was reading that you were a finalist on Jim Henson’s Creature Shop Challenge in 2015. Which must have been an amazing experience. Was that a major stepping stone for your career?
BB: I definitely wouldn’t take it back. If I had the opportunity, I would definitely do it again. It was just really stressful. The reality show aspect of it was just way too stressful. And, that part of it wasn’t very fun. But, to be given free rein with no budget to make whatever you want, that was a lot of fun. I think that the connections I made from being on the show and being able to get my name out there in a new, different way were really beneficial. I think that in a lot of ways that was kind of how I cemented my position at Stoopid Buddy Stoodios.
JB: I was looking at some of the creations, and some of them are completely wacky. But, you’ve also had the opportunity to make puppets for Rick and Morty. Do you have anyone puppet that is your favourite one that you have made?
BB: There’s two that contend for the top. One of them is the 14 and ½ foot tall walk around puppet that we made for a touring event for League of Legends, which is a big video game. We toured for most of 2016 with that, and I think we broke the Guinness Book of World Records for tallest cosplay. That was really great collaborating with Riot Games. And the other one that vies for first would be Fletch from Blark and Son. I know he seems similar to the other puppets, but there are small things that are different about the way that he was made. The sculpting. The nuance of some of the things that made that puppet. I feel like its probably the most successful puppet in the show.
JB: Excellent. I mentioned Rick and Morty, and I read that you recently got married to Justin Roiland’s sister, Amy Roiland. Congratulations by the way. So, did you end up meeting her through Justin, or was it the other way around?
BB: It was the other way around. I was actually on set for a commercial for a bunch of years there was a long-running commercial called The Foster Farms Chicken. They had puppets that were kind of like the ambassadors of this chicken brand. I was part of the build team and the puppeteer crew. My wife, Amy, was an extra, just like a club goer. We were literally brushing shoulders for a few hours, and she just hit on me really hard to be honest with you. It was really fun, and after we started talking the rest is basically history. At that time Justin hadn’t made Rick and Morty yet. He was just kind of getting ready to gear up for the first season. So, he hadn’t really blown up, and all that stuff hadn’t really made him so famous yet.
JB: So, when do you get a character on Rick and Morty?
BB: That’s a good question, haha. I think from Justin’s point of view, if I were in him, not that he has expressed this to me, but I think I would probably feel nervous to hire somebody who I was really close to, in case they didn’t do a satisfactory job. You wouldn’t be able to critique them or fire them. I think being part of the family- Like, hiring my brother to do something, and if he didn’t do a really great job, I’d be in a really tough spot. So, I don’t expect anything from him. I’m very happy that he has got the success that he has. And, once in a while I get to reap some of the benefits of the relationship, and like cast him in my show. Which I was very happy to do because I knew he’d do a good job. It was a minor role, and he knocked it out in probably an hour and a half. Very happy to have him involved.
JB: I’m a big fan of the father-son connection between Blark and his son. I’m a father myself, and I’d love to just drop some of the things Blark says and see my sons reaction. There are some quotes I love. So, how did the concept for the show come about?
BB: So, there’s some deep-rooted stuff that was part of my life that I didn’t even understand what it was, and how it was going to formulate until Blark and Son happened. My grandfather is basically the manliest guy ever. He was John Wayne’s stunt double. He was one of the people that cofounded the stunt double’s association. He has some of the craziest stories I have ever heard. He tells them every time we are at Thanksgiving dinner or the holidays or whatever it is. He literally saved an Indian village from a man-eating tiger. It sounds crazy, but this shit’s just real. And so, someone who is overly as manly as him was always such a big part of my life. And, how he interacted with our whole family – he’s a really gruff guy who doesn’t take shit from anybody. When I was younger, we didn’t have much to connect on, because I was basically just glued to my gaming system and tinkering with parts and stuff in my garage. He wasn’t an artist, I mean he was a pretty accomplished woodworker. So, there was a little bit of a juxtaposition there, and that kind was just with me all of the time. I hadn’t thought about making that content until I started getting really interested in making content again. I’ve made a lot of sketch comedy, and I used to write a lot more with all of my friends in my early twenties. I kind of took a back seat for a little while because I had to make money. And, when I became stable enough, I was able to get back into making content, and I thought it would be really great to tell some stories about a single dad who is an overly manly father trying to bond with his overly nerdy, squeamish son. And, trying to bridge that very large generational gap between the two of them. And, kind of pull from my own experiences and speak to this nuance that I feel like a lot of people can relate to, which is some universal father-son truth.
JB: Wow, that is pretty cool. Like, he actually saved a whole village from a man-eating tiger? That’s a true story?
BB: Haha, it’s a true story. I have seen the tiger skin.
JB: That is crazy. So, Christopher Mintz-Plasse plays the son, which is amazing casting. Was he on the project pretty early when you started producing this?
BB: Yes. So, I went to high school with Chris, and we’ve been friends forever. He is in a bunch of my old sketch videos I was telling you about. We were in a band together for a group of years. So, when this show, when we started to develop it, it became a no-brainer for us. I was like “yeah, Chris you want to do this?” and he was totally onboard. And, it was a really great fit. I was trying to find the Blark voice for a long time, and the minute I heard him do Son, everything kind of clicked. And it really made a lot of sense, and I fell right into the character of Blark. He brings so much to the table, he’s such an accomplished and talented voice actor, I feel very lucky to have him part of it.
JB: I was going to ask if it took you guys time to develop a rapport, but you went to high school together.
BB: Yeah, lots of people that are involved with Blark and Son I have known for a long time and they all happened to become very talented industry people.
JB: You’ve also had some pretty amazing guests like Patton Oswalt, Donald Faison, we were saying Justin Roiland, and Jim Rash. When you are writing characters for this show, do you have any of these actors in mind? Or, do they just kind of come in?
BB: It was a tiny bit of both. We didn’t cast the show before we started writing, but we did get the show cast towards the tail end of writing. So, we started to understand who was going to be who at that point. We had a few actors in mind for Stacey Swanson, when we heard Jim Rash was interested, it was like throw everybody out. This is exactly who we want, this is our top pick. He was such a perfect pick for the role, so I was very happy to hear that. Then, Donald Faison is also a really big fan of puppetry and practical effects. He’s made it a point for himself to speak an interest to those things. I’ve seen him around Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, he likes to go there a lot. He actually stop-motion animates on his own sometimes. When he first heard about it as well, he was immediately interested and onboard. I think that interest in practical effects kind of sealed the deal for him. And, again, so perfect for Fletch, I can’t think of anybody else who could come close to what he brought to that character. And, Patton Oswalt, I was going to say, we had a really talented casting director working with us on the show. She was the one who kind of secured Jim Rash and Patton Oswalt. I’m not sure what he saw that made him want to do it, but obviously, it was something, and I am thankful that he took a risk on it and jumped in. He brought a lot to that role, and I’d be happy to have him back.
JB: Absolutely, all of those guys are great in anything they do. I was wondering how much manpower goes into one episode. Like it must be so much work?
BB: There is an incredible amount of work. It is hard to say for one episode per se because we shot things in a very out of order fashion. Like, we would shoot sets out. So, we would set up Son’s room specifically his desk, the corner of his room, and we would shoot every single line, every single scene that happens in the entire show in every episode in that one shot. So we wouldn’t have to revisit it and lose the time that would take to set up that set again. It’s hard to give a direct answer to how many hours of manpower came into it. Put it this way, every single thing on screen is custom. We don’t just go out and buy a one-third scale house. The entire house is all custom made from the ground up. It is raised up three-and-a-half feet off the ground, so we have room to puppeteer it. The monitor system that I’ve developed that we can use for the show – because when puppeteers are puppeteering you need to be able to look at the monitor so you can see what the camera sees, so you know where you are spatially. I developed a very unique monitor system that helps us move quickly. There are all kinds of custom rigs and engineering that went into just making the show possible. They were all supported by our crew which at first wasn’t a crew that was super familiar with puppets. A week into it they picked it up and were really proficient and understood the game. So, it’s kind of hard to answer the manpower question because we didn’t do one episode at a time.
JB: It took nine months in total you were saying? For all of the episodes?
BB: Yes. Nine months in total from the first day of writing to the last delivered episode.
JB: When I was telling my friend I was interviewing you today he wanted me to make sure to ask you about producing a video for Slash, and how that came about?
BB: I directed a music video for Slash, I think it was in August. That was basically a much different style from Blark and Son. It was one-sixth scale puppets that were driving cars. We did a lot of drone shots, specialty built rigs and stuff. That was a blast. But, it was like, I don’t know, two weeks to get everything made and shot.
JB: So, can we expect to see some more Blark and Son’s episodes soon? This year?
BB: This year? I don’t know. I can’t answer exactly when. We have a lot of plans for where it’s going to be going in the future. But, there’s a lot of other moving parts on how that will work. So, I can’t really give an honest answer at the moment. But, we got some big plans for the future of Blark, for sure.
JB: Awesome. Do you have any other upcoming projects?
BB: Um, everything is currently in development. A lot of things that are still in early development, either in writing or early production phases. Nothing to announce formally yet, no.
JB: I just had one more question. Blark? It is such a strange name, where did the name Blark come from?
BB: Haha. So, in the fundamental concept of the show, I really wanted the dad to be the quintessential manliest guy ever. I feel like there is something really manly about as many consonants as you can fit into a word. “Blark” just feels like a really consonant-heavy name that sounds like leather wrapped around steel or something. You know what I mean? It sounds like some part of the sword that hasn’t been used yet. So, that’s kind of where it came from. I really wanted it to be this quintessential manly sound that ended up being his name.
JB: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us. Congratulations on the success of the show.
BB: Thank you very much. I’ve been very happy with the response.
Blark and Son can be found on the official Comedy Central website, or click here.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
I hope this turns out to be another Gravity Falls-type show with an overarching storyline.