Web series 'Crewing Up' brings the funny

Crewing Up Cast and Crew:  Jonathan Ziegler

Many times, a writer draws from personal experience to tell a story.  For Crewing Up, a new web series, Melissa Cushman Banczak draws from her experiences being around public access television at Access Tucson, but expands the story from there. Viagra spiked cookies, attempted live television homicide, a reenactment of George Washington crossing of the Delaware, but in the nude, and alien abductions are just a taste of the wacky situations explored in Crewing Up.

Sentenced to 500 hours of community service at a public access station, Addie Kent, brilliantly played by Dallas Thomas, brings a fiery, no nonsense attitude with her to the station that is brimming with interesting characters.  Fresh off her attempted murder of fiancé Frank Mann, played by Eric Schumacher, host of political talk show Frankly Speaking, Addie continually finds herself in situations that test her patience, often resulting in an explosive outburst.  Addie struggles with her reality as the lowest woman on the totem pole, getting coffee, and sweeping the station, rather than the producer-in-charge role she is accustomed to.  But she quickly finds a confidant in Will Warwick, elegantly played by Jonathan Northover.

Crewing Up takes comedy in the common direction you find on television and in most films today, traveling down the road of sexual innuendo.  From Addie’s somewhat unhealthy sexual “attraction” to filmmaking objects, microphones, cords, cameras, to the struggles of the men at the station to win the affection of blonde bombshell Tina Jensen, played by Stephanie Sikes, Crewing Up turns up the heat just the right amount.  Tina and Addie develop a strange, but powerful bond after a drunken night out that is tested throughout the series, despite Tina’s interest and encounters with Will, whom Addie finds herself falling for.

The show manages to maintain the funny by mixing absurdity, deadpan, and situational comedy.  This balance is found through the quieter scenes of dialogue many of the characters share with each other, especially those with Will and Zack Mabbetson, played by Todd Gaston.  See Episode Seven, Of Mice, Men, and a Frosty Cold One, for more of these bonding moments like Addie and Holly, played by Michele Loera, hanging out on the couch with some beers.

The present and future training ground of many independent filmmakers, the internet and the growth of webisodic television and mastery of its tools is paramount to succeeding in today’s diminishing marketplace. Studios are going to be less inclined to finance pilots and the like as series like Crewing Up are doing the work for them. But if you are one of the filmmakers putting out quality web based work like Melissa Cushman Banczak, you will find yourself at the front of the line when the jobs start coming back.

Crewing Up will be available on DVD at Amazon in August 2009. A script book containing all of Season One, and the scripts for a second unproduced season will also be available, probably in September 2009. Keep up with Melissa’s work or go watch Crewing Up right now at Fried Egg Films.

For more info: 
Watch Crewing Up Now
Melissa Cushman Banczak's Website