James Gunn: "My episode, my particular show is Humanzee, the story of my mutant chimp hybrid son played by my brother Sean. I think it’s been the peak of my creative life. It’s the most far out, craziest, f--ked up thing I've ever done in my entire life. But I’m really happy with it, I really am. It’s been so much fun. My best friend, Stevie Blackheart, is producing. I'm working with my brother Sean. My good friend Pete Alton is doing the cinematography and it's just been so much fun."
"We're helping to define an art form. I really think that for many years, you know, for years and years and years people would open up their daily newspapers and they'd read Doonesbury or Garfield or whatever every single day. Well, that's kind of died out and people don’t really read comic strips anymore. Now what they do is they log on to their computer and they watch a two or three-minute funny video every day. And that's what these things are - they're like the modern comic strip. They're also the heir to the sitcom. They're just six-minute sitcoms, as opposed to 22 minute sitcoms. And it feels like being Milton Berle back in the 1950s when television was the Wild West and nobody knew what it was going to be. They had to define what the soap opera was. They had to define what the variety show was. That's what we’re doing now, you know, and it’s fun."
It seems like a perfect outlet for comedy/horror directors.
James Gunn: "Totally, and most horror directors I know are pretty funny. Sometimes unintentionally, but they're pretty funny. I'm actually cheating, I'm cheating because I started out as a comic, so for me it’s a complete cheat but that's okay."
So you tortured your brother by making him actually dress up as a chimpanzee?
James Gunn: "Oh god, he’s so tortured, he is so tortured. And we’re talking about turning Humanzee into a continuing series. If we do, we’re going to have to change the makeup because he’s in complete agony the whole time. I mean sometimes I make jokes about it and say that's my favorite part of making Humanzee, but the god’s honest truth is that it's very hard to watch my brother for 12 hours at a time being in physical agony and trying to focus on getting all this other stuff out of the piece. But he did it and he went through it."
"I have a history of torturing my brother Sean. In Tromeo and Juliet I made him shave his head into three little ponytails and I crushed his head on a fire hydrant. And then in The Specials he had to shave his head bald and paint himself green for two months. So I've got a history of torturing him physically. I must have some unconscious hatred. We hang out all the time, but I must have some unconscious hatred."
And you wonder why he even returns your phone calls...
James Gunn: "You do, you do. I know. He’s desperate for the attention, I guess."
And you may turn your short film into a series? Just your film or some of the others, too?
James Gunn: "I think most of them could be a continuing series. You know, Lucky’s is very funny. It’s about the dumbest, hottest girl in the world, and it’s great. She’s been raised in a barn and she doesn’t know how to do basic things like use a fork or sit in a chair - she's that dumb. And it’s just fantastic."
David Slade's sounds really interesting.
James Gunn: "Oh Meatdog is awesome. Meatdog is… You really have to have David explain it. I like watching it but I don’t know if I can quite explain it. I think David has a completely logical way of talking about it. It’s something to do with a dog made out of various cuts of meat who destroys an army of cultish bunny rabbits in a war against them. To David it’s all very logical, but I don’t quite understand it, and that's coming from the man who created Humanzee so it’s definitely far out there."
These are going to be free online?
James Gunn: "They're going to be free online on X-Box in the fall."
Do you hope to involve other directors if it’s a hit?
James Gunn: "Oh yes, definitely. And in fact we have two more directors that one of whom I’m pretty sure we know who it is, who’s a big name, and then somebody else who is another good director but I’m not totally certain about that one. But we’re going to announce two more directors over the coming weeks who will be doing these with us, yes."
