More From the Milwaukee Film Festival

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Broadcasting live from the Civic Media Studios in Green Bay.

This is Night Light with Pete Chihuahua.

Your inside source on everything entertainment from Wisconsin to Hollywood.

And now, a guy who never leaves the house without wearing a cup, Pete Chihuahua.

Welcome back.

Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, a Madison version of the show this Thursday night.

It's like the Christmas Eve of weeknights.

Great to have you with me.

Hopefully we are helping you wind down after a long day.

Great to have you as we talk about all the things in life that make us happy.

Movies and TV and comedy.

Our question of the night is, what is your favorite song from a movie?

From the 715, Joe says, call on me from Warfare.

It's a great movie.

I just saw that last weekend.

Possibly the best, you hate to say the best war film, but just an amazing film.

That's a great one, Joe.

We've got to catch up on text.

We'll do that in a little bit.

Right now, Toby Jones is here.

He's the director and the writer of A.J.

Goes to the Dog Park, and he's joined by his buddy and producer, Ben Hansen.

These two guys worked together on this film and had a blast doing it.

They're from Fargo, North Dakota.

A.J.

Goes to the Dog Park has three screenings at the Milwaukee Film Festival Friday, this Friday at 10 p.m.

at the Oriental.

April 29th at 9 p.m.

at the Oriental and also am I missing one guys?

There's a 26th right at the Downer or something like that.

I'll pull it up here.

I Don't

want to steer

people wrong.

There we go.

Yeah 29th on Tuesday at the Oriental and May 2nd at the Downer So it's great to have you guys.

Thanks for sticking around a little bit when we were talking between the breaks you mentioned budget and it's so rare that independent filmmakers want to talk about budget

So I admire you for that.

What do you have to say about it?

We talked about how it was a nano budget, but what does that mean exactly?

What it means is that the production of the movie was funded by us out of our pockets, just a few of us with what we could scrap together at that time.

And it was shot over three years and each year we put a little bit of money together and shot a section of the movie each year.

And so by the time it was done, the total shooting budget, I've been describing it as clerks not adjusted for inflation.

So it's just like, but again, it does speak to that thing of it's like, yeah, with what we have available to us, you can go shoot a movie with what you have access to.

Ben, anything you'd like to add to that?

Well, and Pete, you are right.

Most independent filmmakers don't like to talk about their budgets, but Toby and I wish we had one.

They had one to talk about, right?

Yeah,

Toby's completely correct, but like it's amazing what you can do when you're arts and crafting it too with a mid-sized town that you grew up in, where a lot of people believe in a vision are incredibly generous, helping you out with props, locations, food, transportation.

I mean, there was a lot, you know,

I would say the majority of this movie, if you went like hardcore counting on it, was in kind, which is incredibly nice of a whole lot of people.

Yeah.

Wow.

Toby, from your standpoint, working in TV and making a film like this, I get that creatively you could probably do whatever you wanted to do.

There's no notes or anything like that.

That must have been fun.

But in terms of how rewarding it was, how do you how do you compare it to working on a show like the regular show?

I mean, they're as similar as they are different because in both cases, you're working with a team of people who are rallying together against all odds to make something funny and weird come into existence.

And so in that ways, it's a lot like working in television on the shows that

I've

been fortunate enough to work on.

In the ways that it is different is that there is no studio supporting it.

There's no studio backing.

You know, on a show like Regular Show or OKKO, it's everybody's day job.

They are clocking in every day and getting paid a living wage to come in and make this happen.

And they have all the resources they need to make it happen.

Whereas making

a

movie

like

Magic Goes to Dog Park, what we don't have is resources.

All we have is the things that we can scrap together ourselves in Fargo, North Dakota at that time.

Yeah, I guess it's similarly rewarding.

But obviously, it being a personal project, it's fun to make choices that you wouldn't necessarily be allowed to make or wouldn't make on a structured television environment.

Was the town of Fargo at all?

I noticed just in the trailer, which is like a minute long, you guys have like, I think, two references to Fargo.

So

you

obviously love that you're from there.

Does the town play a character at all in the film?

In an unspoken way, it does.

Yes.

You know, it's not necessarily a movie about Fargo, but it is in that the Fargo-ness is just like baked into every single scene because, you know, okay, we don't have a studio backing.

We don't have a bunch of budget.

What do we have?

If we go to Fargo, we have all kinds of people, places, and things that you don't normally see in a movie.

And so that

kind of becomes part of the appeal.

It's like, well, oh, there are all kinds of people and things that you normally wouldn't get against in a movie that we'll put in here.

And that'll be one of the things that makes it hopefully kind of unique and entertaining.

One thing I mentioned is that if we have scenes of characters having dinner, they're drinking milk with dinner.

you know, we're feeling a bunch of cups of milk and that's just like kind of planting a flag of just how Fargo, truly Fargo, the movie is.

Whatever happened to the days where you just go over to someone's house and they offer you a glass of milk and you take it?

Yeah, yeah, look, and it was so funny when I moved to LA, it's like, you drink milk with dinner?

It's like, I'm sorry, I didn't know.

That's so funny.

I don't know when that's

not a good thing.

Yeah.

So I know all about the regular show and, you know, one of my favorite episodes is The One Cheek Wonder.

I love all that.

It's just such a great show.

But tell me about OK KO Let's Be Heroes.

I don't I don't know much about that.

That's another show you worked on.

Yeah, that's a show that was created by my friend Ian Jones-Cordy.

And he had been working on a show called Steven Universe for quite a while.

And and he made his own show, which is kind of like a

comedic, you know, Cartoon Network show set in a world very much inspired by fighting video games and superheroes.

So it's like the concept is that it's a bunch of characters working a crappy day job at a convenience store, but the entire world is populated by people with crazy superpowers and magic and video game inspires weirdness.

I was just, I just said something come back to me.

I posted on Facebook, this is years ago, I said, I've always wanted to date a girl named The Power.

And I

just

wanted

to

see, I just wanted to see what kind of response I got.

I think I got like two, like nobody knew what that was talking about.

You know, just beautiful.

Well, especially if it was back when the show first was coming out.

Cause you know, like, like a lot of these shows, it took a little while to become popular.

So like if you were watching that show, when that episode first aired, it's like you're, you're on the cutting edge of a cool new thing.

Thanks to my kids.

Yeah, exactly.

It's a great show.

What is next for you guys?

You did this cool indie film.

You got it into all these festivals.

Do you go back to your jobs now or are you planning something else?

Both.

Both of those things are true.

I mean, we were all working the whole time.

We were all working day jobs the whole time.

I'm back.

I'm still working in animation right now, but we are indeed fingers crossed hoping to shoot our next movie.

uh later this year uh we'll see how it goes that's that's the intention we're hoping we're hoping to shoot some stuff soon at a at a nano budget again or i i'd one of the most i'll go ahead ben i'll answer that question

i'd one of the more intense moments of my life where i was trying to uh fill finish out a grant review at my job at the time of the local united way

finished grad school to do finals and I was running for county commissioner at the time while we were finishing our principal photography on the I think third round of shooting I want to say but to answer your question it won't be a nano budget next time once we meet all the our future producers at the Milwaukee

Oh, we

got

a,

we

got

a big unfortunately you lagged out for your joke.

But, but yeah, the next one, uh, yeah, it's, it hopefully, hopefully some, hopefully some producers come along, uh, who offer us a blank check to shoot the next movie, but more likely we're going to try and see if we can make something actually even smaller and see if we can pull that

off.

Oh, that's so great.

Uh, Toby Jones and Ben

Hansen are a little more dialogue based and maybe a little less visual, but I think it'll be an interesting swerve.

I'll be that's okay.

I'll be anxious to see what you guys do next and I cannot wait to see the whole film of AJ goes to the dog park What I do typically guys with guests is ask them what they're watching Are you guys binge watching anything before we let you go anything you could

recommend?

I'm watching the new Gundam show on Amazon, and also just started watching Common Side Effects, which is an animated adult swim show that I would strongly recommend to pretty much anybody.

It's pretty amazing.

Okay.

Common Side Effects.

All right.

What about you, Ben?

I just watched for the first time Dead Town Society, which is a Taiwanese

a reality TV comedy parody that I was airing at Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, where we were featured, but I wasn't able to go, but it's on Netflix now.

And it is a very funny time.

I just caught Ryan Coogler's Sinners, which I was very impressed by.

I'm always impressed by his work.

And I thought this one was him truly cashing in, you know, going on leashed, you know, non IP, and I really enjoyed that.

And I just rewatched and showed my partner for the first time.

Tony Scott's true 4k steelbook that I got a bit ago on sale, but I hadn't watched it before still holds up still great movie

Did we get the title there?

Did you get the title romance

right?

Oh true romance.

Oh great film.

Yeah, my favorite actor in that movie Tony

romance on the 4k on the steelbook.

Yeah, that's fantastic

guys.

Listen, there's a lot to choose from there.

Yeah

It's great to see you guys That you're both like these cinephiles at a young age and you're still doing this stuff and talking so enthusiastically about movies and TV.

I absolutely love it Break a leg with all the screenings.

Hopefully they go great I'm sure they will and keep us posted on what you guys are up to would love to have you guys back again sometime if you want to come

Great.

Thank you so much.

You're welcome.

I'm

glad you're I'm glad you're willing to call us young

Well, you might be older than Sam, so I don't know, it's all relative.

But guys, have a great night.

Thank you so much.

And break a leg.

You too.

Thanks

a

lot.

All right, thank you.

That's Toby Jones and

Ben

Hansen.

You got it.

And buckle up, Ben.

Their film, A.G.

Goes to the Dog Park, has three screenings at the Milwaukee Film Festival.

It's just a great festival on the east side of Milwaukee there.

It's going to be a lot of fun.

Check it out.

We have another Film Festival guest coming up soon.

Did you know that, Sam?

I knew that we had another guest.

I didn't know that he was from the film

festival.

Mark Evans.

Exciting stuff.

Yeah, he's going to talk about a film called The Diamond King.

Oh, that'll be fun.

Let's catch up on some texts here.

Karla from Baraboo.

Our question of the night, by the way, is what is your favorite song for a movie?

I feel like we could almost do a whole episode just on movie songs, but we'll try to get through these texts.

Karla, this is Conrad's Aunt Karla.

See, even when Conrad is not here,

His family is on the periphery of

the

show.

I have never gotten any member of my family to listen to the show that I produce, usually.

My wife has no idea where I go at night.

She thinks I'm gambling.

So, Carla says, favorite song from a movie, she's like the wind, dirty dancing.

Grandma Krieger says, hello, hello, Grandma Krieger.

And that's a great, that's Patrick Swayze.

That's the Swayze Master General saying that song, Carla.

I don't know if you knew that.

And then Tom from Anona says, come and get your love or father and son from The Guardians.

Is that Guardians of the Galaxy or The Guardians?

I don't know that movie.

Thank you, Tom.

Jameson from Pennsylvania says, adding every single, every single sing in Rocky Horror, but that was a musical first.

There's some great music in Rocky Horror.

Great text Jameson.

Thank you.

I haven't seen Jameson for a while.

Good to have you back, buddy Tony the trucker says Pete.

I'm a believer from Shrek Yeah, all those kids movies have great soundtracks and great songs.

I love Toy Story You've got a friend in me all these great songs That's a great one Tony Jameson from Pennsylvania also says wait

Is it best music written for a movie?

Five exist.

Power of Love by Huey Lewis.

Back in Time, Back to the Future.

Ghostbusters by Ray Parker Jr.

that ripped off Huey Lewis.

I'm alright, Caddyshack.

Dangerzone, Top Gun.

There are no others unless talking on David Bowie and the Labyrinth.

Jameson's on fire tonight.

We'll be back with more of your texts and Mark Evans will be here to talk about his film, The Diamond King.

What's your favorite song, folks, from a movie?

That's what we're talking about here on Nightlight.

I'm Pete Schwabba.

This is the Civic Media Radio Network.

You're listening to Civic Media.

Stay up to date on the latest news and information for your local community and Wisconsin by signing up for our free email newsletter.

Visit civicmedia.us slash email to get started.

a mini-series to get through these texts, Sam.

These are great.

Our question of the night is what is your favorite song from a movie?

There's so many good ones.

So many good ones, I know.

Anna from Madison says, Hi Pete and Sam, my favorite song from a movie is the Barbara Streisand song, The Way We Were From the Movie, The Way We Were.

That song played at the end of the movie.

I tear up every time I hear it.

Sherry from Horakon says, we are the champions from Queen, but also in a movie.

Yes, yes, Sherry, that's a great one.

Sherry also says, actually, any of the songs from that movie, I love Queen.

Sherry continues saying, when I lived in Illinois and we won the basketball championship, they played that.

Oh, that's a trip down memory lane.

Yeah, high school has all those great sports songs.

Tyler from Wisconsin Rapids says, Goldfinger.

That's like a James Bond thing, but all I remember is Beyonce singing Gold Member.

from Austin Powers.

That's where my brain goes.

All right, we'll keep those texts coming, folks.

Be part of the show.

Always more fun when you guys participate.

Here's one from Chris Casper.

I love this.

Chris says, my heart will go on a Titanic.

I was just about to call him a big softy because he's like 6'12 and a mountain of muscle.

And he says, just kidding.

Highway to the danger zone.

Top gun.

I don't know, Chris.

You kind of surprised me with the Titanic thing.

And then you went back into the cliche of a big burly dude.

Hope you're well, buddy.

Hope to see you tomorrow.

Hey, I'm doing the show for Madison tonight, folks.

It's great to have you with me on Night Light.

Conrad is on vacation.

Sam Davison is sitting in tonight, the typical producer of John and Gordy here on WMDX in the morning, helping me through Night Light here tonight.

And we are about to bring in our second guest from the Milwaukee Film Festival.

His film is called The Diamond King.

It's a documentary about a guy named Dick Perez, and we will talk about it with our guest and the brains behind the film who joins us now over the stream, Mark Evans.

Hey, Mark.

Hey, Pete.

How you doing?

I'm doing well.

So did you have time to think about a film or a song from a movie?

Yeah, I was telling Pete over the break that I...

I was like, oh, I can't think of a song from a movie that I've had enough.

Somebody said Highway to the Danger Zone, and that takes me back to being a kid, watching Top Gun for the first time.

I still couldn't think of anything that I felt like was like, yeah, that's what I want to say.

But

I did have

a minute to give a little tidbit about taking me out to the ball game, which

is, of

course, in every baseball movie.

There's even a version of it in my film, The Diamond King.

I had a composer named Andrew Joslin who did the original score for our movie.

And he, so we had to incorporate a little bit of taking me out to the ball game, but the way he

did it is really amazing and it builds up in a totally original composition and then hits the chorus at the right moment.

And so I love how it's done in our, in our movie, but in the process of, you know, watching so many baseball movies, I realized, yeah, it's in every single movie.

And, but a little known fact, it was written in 1908 by Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer by two people who had never watched a baseball game in their lives before they wrote that song.

It's become the anthem.

That's incredible.

All right, well, that's a good answer.

Mark, you did okay.

I went with Power of Love from Back to the Future and then Stuck in the Middle with You from Tarantino's, the Tarantino movie that I cannot think of the name right now.

But that's a

great answer.

Power of Love, absolutely.

That would have to be right up there for me, too.

I think earlier you were playing something, must have been Caddyshack.

Was that from

Caddyshack?

Yeah, I'm all right.

Kenny Log.

There's just so many.

Like I picked two and I'm probably missing a thousand that I love that come up like sympathy for the devil.

Somebody said, one of the textures said, Atlantis from Goodfellas.

And that's when Tommy's killing Spider, like all these great kind of a dark moment, but a great song.

So

yeah, absolutely.

Well, it's great to have you here tonight, Mark.

You're joining us from Seattle, I understand.

Yeah, yeah in Bremerton Washington actually just it's a ferry ride into Seattle

nice Wow nice.

That's a is that a convenient place to live Do you have to get on the ferry just to get groceries or is it?

No, not at all.

It's a regular It's you know, 40,000 person town other towns around here, too But it's it's nice to have good access to Seattle but not but be be removed away from all the hustle and bustle.

Yeah All right, so we've got

We're going to keep you through the news, but we've got a couple minutes before the news.

Why don't we start with just a little bit about you, like what brought you to the point where you have this cool movie called The Diamond King that you're about to show at the Milwaukee Film Festival.

Give us some of your background, if you will.

Yeah, so I made a couple feature films before this.

In 2016, I put out a movie called The Glamour and the Squalor about a rock radio DJ that was the first to play all the grunge music that came out of Seattle in the early 90s.

And then I made a film called Clay Dream about a guy named Will Vinton, who was called the godfather of claymation.

So he invented like the California raisins were big characters, but he built a company from his garage into this $40 million dollar year company and then has it kind of ripped away from him by...

other than Phil Knight, the founder of Nike.

So those were two films.

Both of those played at the Milwaukee Film Festival during their runs, too, and that festival became one of my favorites.

So when I had this new film, I was hoping to come back.

So it's going to be back, you know, coming back to Milwaukee for the festival for the Diamond King.

And with that film, I just

those previous films were about five year projects.

And I wanted to find something that I could do in a shorter amount of time that didn't have to take five years.

That ended up being about a two year process, still a long endeavor, but very fast for me to do something in two years.

And really it was just, it was the art that I was attracted to.

I was not really looking for a new project.

I had other projects I was developing and they weren't getting picked up yet.

And I found,

My son and I my son got into baseball.

We were looking he got into baseball cards So we were looking at my old collection and we stumbled upon some baseball cards that dick Perez the subject of my film made when I was collecting cards as a kid and seeing these cards just kind of Transported me back to being a kid and I had that feeling nostalgia and so I just started researching What's the story of this artist who made these cards that I loved and that unlocked so many things I that's when I found out that this

Dick Perez had painted literally thousands and thousands and thousands of baseball paintings.

He was the head, the official artist of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York for 20 years.

So he'd painted the whole history of baseball.

He made a career of painting baseball and he's got a really interesting personal story as well too.

So I thought all those things together could make for a fun documentary where we can tell his story and really kind of the history of baseball through his work.

That's a great.

What a great way to do that too through the art and I just think that's well, I'm excited to hear What it was like dealing with dick Perez because he sounds like kind of a character Had a very interesting life.

So we'll talk more about that with my guest mark Evans Our question tonight.

You can still get in on the fun folks.

What's your favorite song from a movie?

This is nightlight with peach

Welcome back.

This is Nightlight with Pete Schwabba.

I am Pete Schwabba.

Sam Davidson riding shotgun tonight while Conrad takes time off to go party at the draft in Green Bay.

So we are doing the show from Madison tonight.

Great to have you with me.

Our question of the night is, what is your favorite song from a movie?

And we've gotten some great responses so far.

Tomorrow night on Nightlight.

This is exciting.

Comedian Rich Scheidner will be here to make the popcorn pick of the week.

That's tomorrow at 6.35.

And then WRJN's Don Rosen will be here.

Frank Anderson on Friday, Terry Bar bringing a surprise live guest for Bar Band Friday Night.

And we'll also have Lisa Hale on from New Wisco Weekend.

Right now, we have a few more minutes with my current guest, Mark Evans, who made the film The Diamond King, which is screening a couple times at the Milwaukee Film Festival, which starts tomorrow night.

It's a great festival.

Check it out.

The venues are...

You're probably familiar with these, Mark.

You've been there before, but the Oriental Theater and the Downer Theater, two great venues on the east side.

What are you most excited about?

When you do something like this, Mark, you're showcasing the work of an artist.

in a documentary how do you keep like that pace going because obviously you have great visuals you probably have really cool colors because he's an artist like what you're showing probably looks beautiful on screen but is there a challenge to make it move or to find pacing as a director

Yeah, I mean, I think that's always one of the most important parts with any story is the pacing and the structure and keeping it entertaining, keeping it moving along, giving enough information, but that's it.

Less is always more, and so it's always got to keep moving.

And then, literally, in this case, we made the decision to bring some of the art to life.

I remember when I first started working with Dick, he had seen my previous film.

clay dream and which was also about an artist, but that was claymation.

So all that all that art was moving already.

And and he thought, well, how do you, you know, that that's that was amazing.

All the art's moving.

My art doesn't move.

And I said, well, I got some ideas and we actually do subtle animations.

So you see the ball, you know, the batter is batting and the ball is coming at him from the picture, like it's moving a little bit.

And it's very subtle.

We didn't want to distract or take too much away from, you know, distract the audience.

But I do think it in hand.

in a way, a lot of these paintings.

But yeah, as far as the story goes, I mean, story is first and foremost, you've always got to have, you know, be entertaining, have a narrative that people are gonna be, you know, not bored with.

And so the pacing of that, it does need to move along.

And I think more and more too, in our just society, you know, people are more used to quick hitting things, hold somebody's attention for 90 minutes, you know, it needs to move.

Absolutely.

And it's funny, I ask you that because

I introduce all the independent lens and POV films here on PBS and write intros for them.

And with documentaries, you still have to have an attention span.

Like, I admit it, I was an English major.

I don't read anymore.

I hate that I don't.

But my attention span is not great.

Like Ken Burns, Civil War and baseball came out years ago before all this.

I don't even know if that pace would work, but he's got great voices.

And do you have to adjust documentary filmmaking?

Do you do that because your audience changes, or do you say, no, this is the film, this is my vision, and this is what I'm doing?

I think there's got to be a little bit of both.

I'm also a fast-talking person.

I have more energy.

So I think naturally I'm going to make things like that.

But as far as adjusting for the fact that people have a 30-second...

mind on things.

And that, I don't think too much of.

I mean, I know documentary, I know feature length still does well.

They're, you know, Netflix is as successful as they are for a reason.

People are still watching this content.

You know, it does make you wonder, like, are they watching the film while they're also looking at their phone and they're also doing something else, you know,

right?

Maybe.

And, and, but I don't know if there's anything that you can do to avoid that as the artist as the filmmaker.

So you just, you know, you make the best thing that you can make and then not become

their problem.

Yeah, exactly.

That's a great answer.

All right, so tell us again a little bit about the Diamond King and Dick Perez.

How did you find Dick?

And at what point did you decide, I want to dedicate a couple years of my life, which you said is not a long time for a documentary, at least not for you.

What made you want to dedicate that amount of time to this guy and his story?

Yeah, so I found him online.

You know, I didn't know him when I had that first feeling of, oh, this could be interesting.

This is something I want to explore a little bit more because I rediscovered those baseball cards that meant so much to me as a kid.

I found his website, dickparez.com, which is a great website.

I mean, all of his art is there.

You can get lost

for

days, which I did in that website.

And so that's when I learned that he had painted the whole history of the game.

again thousands and thousands of paintings I heard I found out there that he was the longtime official artist of the Hall of Fame and so that there was more than just these cards if it was just the cards I would have thought oh cool I know more about him now but I wouldn't have you know thought that this could be a movie

right

and so and then and then I heard you know read about some of his biography so there was enough there and I got excited enough and I love baseball and thought this could be a fun project there was enough there that I thought well I'm gonna reach out to him and and if he doesn't respond he doesn't respond and you know

Maybe I would send a follow-up email, but maybe not.

Maybe it was just like, let's reach out and see what happens.

Well, he gets back to me.

And then we set up a call.

That call was great.

We hit it off.

He's a good communicator.

And so I knew that he could probably be pretty good on camera.

But even then, we kept it pretty casual.

I was going to be in New York already, which is where he lives, two months later.

So I said, why don't I come?

I'll spend a couple extra days.

I'll bring my camera and we'll shoot.

We'll shoot for a weekend and see how it goes.

And it went great.

And the footage was great.

We had a good time together.

And so we were off and running.

We never really stopped.

But it was very, very kind of casual to start it out.

So did you think like as a director, like, all right, I'm going to make the paintings, the focus of the film, along with his story?

And like, how did you make that?

How did it move?

Or how cinematic was it?

Like, what was going to be the focus of the film when you started out?

Yeah, so very the focus of the film when we started out is very similar to what it ended up being which was I wanted to tell his story and And show off as much of his work as possible And then also have a component where I was telling a history of baseball not the Ken Burns 20-hour version But what we could kind of incorporate through Dick Perez's own story and so the the way that I wanted to do that Which is what you see in the film is we have this on-camera narrator.

We were fortunate enough to get the

great actor, John Ortiz, who you've seen in, you know, recently in American fiction, which was Oscar nominated two years ago, Bad Monkey on Apple, The Madness is a newer show on Netflix.

So John Ortiz, great actor.

Oh, he

is.

I was able to get him as an on-camera narrator.

And so he is kind of like the voice of baseball.

And his narration is written by Joe Posnanski, who's probably the leading baseball writer in America, the writer of a book called The Baseball 100, kind of fairly recently.

And so Joe wrote this narration.

in collaboration with me, he was kind of responding to the edit that I had, which was more of Dick's story.

And anytime he thought, oh, we can tell a little history of baseball right here, he would kind of start slotting those things in.

So we went back and forth that way.

And then John, when he's on screen doing this narration, he's surrounded by projections of more art.

So it was partly an excuse to show more art, but also be able to tell this history of baseball.

So there are stories from...

the baseball origins of the 1800s all the way till present day that are depicted in that narration, that on-camera narration.

John Ortiz is in a show called The Madness with Coleman Domingo.

He's so good.

The show was good, but he was great.

He's a really good actor.

He's a great actor.

He just so happened to be next door neighbors with my best friend in San Monica.

So when I was telling my friend about this movie a couple of years ago, he said, well, you should just get...

my buddy John and it was John Ortiz and it all worked out.

That's huge.

Mark Evans is here.

He is the director behind the film, The Diamond King, about Dick Perez and his paintings.

And it's a great documentary.

I assume everything I've read about it is great.

I have not seen it yet, but I can't wait to.

It screens the Milwaukee Film Festival twice.

So check that out.

It is May 2nd and May 6th.

I think they're both at the Oriental, if I'm not mistaken.

But he's going to do a Q&A.

Do you like to do the Q&As?

I do.

Yeah, I struggle a little bit with this part of the process.

I love the process of making the movie.

I love coming up with the idea and developing it and getting it made.

I love the editing.

I love when it's finished.

I'm trying to get to love the part of putting it out there.

The film comes out digitally as well on Friday, this Friday.

Obviously, you know, um, Apple and Amazon, so to buy and to rent.

So you can buy and rent it on Apple and Amazon.

But if you're, if you're Milwaukee based, come see it at the, at

the festival and,

you know, come say hi to me, come to the Q and A. But, um, but yeah, this part, it's, but it, and it's just partly because, um, you know, it was so much fun making it.

And then you're usually off to the next one, you know, you're making your next project.

And that's the part that I have so much fun with, but I am trying to get better.

I'm trying to get better at, at having as much fun with.

with this phase.

The Q&A is different though.

Interacting with people, the actual Q&A part of it, I always enjoy

those.

Right.

Yeah, that to me is the best part about the film festival experience.

You just can't be talking to the filmmakers.

This is a great story too because there's an immigrant angle to it.

Dick is from Puerto Rico.

Was he a baseball fan or just an artist interested in the subjects or was he a real fan?

Yeah, he didn't know anything about baseball.

when he grew up in Puerto Rico now he he lost his dad in a tragic accident when he was five years old when he was six years old his mom put him on a plane to go to Harlem New York where

they had

distant relatives this was in 1946 this was before like the big um uh uh there's a term for it that i've run a blank on but where a lot of people from Puerto Rico did come to New York was was where a lot of them ended up this hadn't really happened yet but there were some early pioneers so dick was put on a plane by himself as a six-year-old

And his mom said, and with his sister, we hope we'll be there in a year.

And so he goes off and he's on a plane by himself, living with strangers, but he met friends right away that played baseball.

And he didn't know the language, he spoke Spanish.

And so he learned how to play.

or he learned the English language and he learned about, you know, really America through the lens of baseball and these friends he was meeting.

So,

uh,

so he loved it from an early age, um, after not knowing about it at first and then, um, wanted to be a baseball player.

He, he, he fell in love with the Yankees and his hero was Mickey Mantle.

He thought he would take over for Mickey Mantle one day in center field.

And then, uh, he tells the story that they started taking their own batting averages and he found out that he's batting one 88.

And so his baseball dreams ended, but luckily he could draw.

Give me a paintbrush.

Yeah, exactly.

That kind of reminded me a little bit of the Sandlot, which is one of my all time favorite movies that I used to watch with my kids.

And it's just so do you have you seen that with your son?

Oh, absolutely.

And actually, I was talking to somebody else today and we were talking baseball movies and I mentioned Field of Dreams and I mentioned Sandlot and he hadn't heard of Sandlot.

Oh, wow.

And so, yeah.

Don't you get excited for someone that hasn't seen something you know they're gonna love?

I mean...

Yeah, absolutely.

And that's one of my favorite... Can you ever imagine your first time seeing the movies that you love?

Right!

the fact that it still gets to be a first time for somebody is amazing.

And that film has the song America the Beautiful by Ray Charles, which is one of the most magical scenes in a movie.

I just absolutely love it.

We have about a minute left, Mark.

It's been great talking to you.

But tell us about, I noticed on IMDB, you have a big foot project.

Can you

give us a synopsis and like less than like, let's say a minute?

Yeah, I can't I actually can't tell you too much.

Oh, the story is a secret and elusive as the creature itself No, I'm really excited say is that it it delves into the famous 1967 footage of Bigfoot, but shot by a guy named Roger Patterson His family is involved in telling the story for the first time.

So it's it's it'll be like the definitive

story of that famous film and everything before, after that still continues to resonate today.

So it's a really fun project.

And I think a lot of people are gonna be pretty excited about it when it comes out.

I can't wait.

I'm fascinated by that whole phenomenon.

So we'll have to, we'll look for that one too.

In the meantime, break a leg at the Milwaukee Film Festival.

Mark, it's been great getting to know you and safe travels, buddy.

Thanks, Pete.

Appreciate it.

You got it.

That's Mark Evans.

Check out his film, The Diamond King, at the Milwaukee Film Festival.

Two screenings May 2nd and 6th, I believe they're both at the Oriental.

He's going to do a Q&A.

Beautiful places to watch movies, folks.

We're going to wrap things up.

Read some of your texts when we come back.

This is Pete Schwabba in Nightlight, coming to you live from Madison tonight on the Civic Media Radio Network.

You're listening to Civic Media.

Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website,

civicmedia.us.

Hey, this is Nightlight with Peach Waba.

Thanks for being with me tonight, folks.

This was a lot of fun, great guests, and your answers on the texts have been fantastic.

I'm gonna try to get through all of these before we have to go.

Dave on the stream also said, melt with you, Valley Girl, great tune.

Anything from fast times at Ridgemont High too, like somebody's baby or an American, I think, I don't even know what the.

He's an American boy or something like that.

That has a great soundtrack as well.

We've got David from Richland Center.

I think I read that.

Don't you forget about me.

That's a great one.

I read Anna's.

Let me see.

I don't want to leave anybody out here.

We've got Sherry and her queen.

Sherry's fixated with Queen.

And that's okay, Sherry.

That's not a bad thing.

Chris Casper with his little ha ha funny.

Big Chill, no.

Oh, Big Chill, that's a great.

Not one song, but all the music used for the Big Chill.

Great soundtrack from the 608.

Totally agree 608.

All iconic songs.

Terry from Cottage Grove, that's the 262.

She says, or she's in her ericote anyways, the 262.

She says, the heat is on for the opening scene of Beverly Hills Cop.

Great one.

Forgot about that one too.

So you could just get lost in these.

Atlantis, it was Jim from Madison who texted in Atlantis from Goodfellas.

And then we've got steady Eddie hungry eyes Gretchen from green bases hungry eyes from dirty dancing I saw you had that queued up Sam and then you you kind of did a pivot there

We might get to it

We'll play that just for you Gretchen and Tom from an onus it clarified it was guardians of the galaxy So thank you for clearing that up Tom steady Eddie Says Pete point of clarification concerning last night's night light.

Oh

In 1964, I placed third in the punt pass and kick competition in my little community.

I still have the plaque to prove it.

All right, now he's, see, he kind of, I'm not saying Steady Eddie kind of built himself up.

He said he placed third in punt passing kick, but now he's saying in his little community, so there might have been like three people, and he took third.

And I'm not disparaging you, Steady Eddie.

You probably are very athletic, but thank you for the clarification.

He says, I still have the plaque to prove it.

I don't think there was a state or national competition back then.

Damn, I could have been a contender.

Lou the Toe Groza was my kicking hero.

My favorite movie song over the rainbow sung by a young, beautiful Julie Garland, Judy Garland in the magical movie, The Wizard of Oz.

I've heard of it.

Another favorite movie song for me is the Rocky theme.

Yes.

We just did a sports song question like a week ago and that came up in that one too, Steady Eddie.

He says, every time I hear it, I get the urge to do 100 pushups and some serious road work, fortunately.

I have a powerful mind, and I am able to resist such temptation, and instead I drink a spotted cow and take a nap on the couch.

Steady Eddie, great stuff, Steady Eddie, thank you so much.

Thank you for all your texts tonight, folks.

Always more fun when you guys participate.

I think I got everything on the, oh PJ said nice one, Sam.

I assume he's talking about bumper music.

Or just the way you do things, Sam, just your aura.

I think PJ is just giving you, did you just tune out there for a minute?

Sorry, I

was

queuing up.

Picking music for the end of the show.

I'm working over here, Schwabba.

So yeah, and great guest.

Thank you to Toby Jones and Ben Hansen and Mark Evans.

Great stuff tonight.

Thanks for the text.

Sam, thank you for riding shotgun.

Do we have time for the, what do we have?

We have two clips.

What do we have time for?

Do we have time for Estelle?

Uh, my best.

Estelle Harris.

Seinfeld,

yeah.

All right.

Here, it's Estelle Harris' birthday, folks.

These are some clips we put together in honor of one of the funniest people to ever grace the little screen, Mrs. Costanza.

This is Estelle Harris from Seinfeld.

This kid's gone places, I told you.

The NBC guy liked it.

Of course he liked it.

He told you he liked it.

He wouldn't put it on if he didn't like it.

Well, what are you doing?

I'm writing.

You know how to write?

Without the writing, you have nothing.

You're the ones that make them look good.

Since when do you know how to write?

I never saw you write anything.

I don't know how you're gonna write all those shows.

And where are you gonna get all the ideas?

When you leave him alone, you'll shatter his confidence.

I don't need any ideas.

It's a show about nothing.

Nothing, please.

I'll tell you the truth.

The whole thing sounds pretty stupid to me.

I always knew you had beautiful hands.

I used to tell people, Frank, didn't I used to talk about his hands?

Who the hell did you ever mention his hands to?

I mentioned his hands...

You

never mention it to me.

And me and Emory Board.

I always talk about your hands, how they're so soft and milky white.

No, you never said milky white.

I said milky white!

So, I talked to Phil Kasikov today.

Phil Kasikov?

Yeah, you know, my friend, the bra salesman.

He says they're looking to maybe put somebody on, so I got you an interview next Friday with his boss.

Next Friday, what time?

Two o'clock.

That's my whole afternoon!

I was gonna look for sneakers!

You can look for sneakers the next day!

He doesn't know anything about bras.

I know a little.

Sides, what do you have to know?

Well, it wouldn't hurt to go in and be able to discuss it intelligently.

My father opened his shirt.

Yeah, and?

Tell him, Primm.

He had

breasts.

What do you mean breasts?

Big breasts.

A lot of older men have that.

No, not these.

These were real hooters.

Estelle Harris, it was her birthday today.

She passed away, I believe, in 2022 or maybe 2018, but she was hilarious.

Tomorrow night, Rich Scheidner, Don Rosen, folks.

You won't want to miss that.

Rich is going to make the popcorn pick of the week.

Don Rosen and I are going to talk about celebrity sightings and all kinds of fun stuff.

Do you think I'm too old to be eligible for the punt passing kick contest?

I

don't think you're ever too old for the punt passing kick contest.

We should do that together.

That will solidify our friendship here and what we accomplished here tonight.

Thank you so much, buddy.

Great stuff tonight, Sam.

And thank you all for listening.

I will be back tomorrow night, also live from Madison, on behalf of the lovable producer, Conrad, who is not here.

Good night, Wisconsin.

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