Plastic!Interview Part Three: Welcome to the Real World
Here's more of our interview with Plastic!Genius Andie Masino, the mastermind behind the addictive Plastic!Winchester Theater. Here, she reveals her secret alter ego, and talks why Supernatural was the show that inspired her to create the much-beloved Plastic!Winchester Theater.
CWS: What do you do in your real life?
In my real life? (Laughs) I'm a scientist in my real life, I work for a pharmaceutical company. My job is very analytical and straightforward, so this is my creative outlet – I can go home at night and think about "I'm going to play with my dolls" and be creative, where at work I'm not.
CWS: Is this something your colleagues at work know you do?
They do not. No
CWS: Is this something you plan on telling them at some point?
If any of them have ever called me and I say "I'm going up to set," I might mention it. My immediate family knows about it. A few weekends ago my best friend came to visit me, and she had not known about it. My spare bedroom is the Barbie room – there's Barbies everywhere, shelves and shelves and shelves of it. I knew once she was in the apartment she would obviously notice – "Did you regress to becoming a 7-year-old girl? What's with the Barbies?" I had to explain to her what it was, and I wasn't quite sure how she'd respond to it. I showed her a random episode, and she laughed and laughed. She said "I'm mad at you! You waited a year to show this to me? This is hilarious! What did you think I'd say?" I didn't know, I didn't know how she'd respond to it. It was very nerve-wracking for me to sit there as she watched it for the first time, if she'd think it was weird. But no, she thought it was hilarious, so that was validating.
CWS: Do you have a photography background, or is it just trial and error?
I never took a photography class. My sister, Reese, was a graphic art major. Growing up with her, she draws all the time, she's very artistic, I did absorb some of that. She took a cinema class, and she would talk about how if you want someone to feel small, you shoot them far away. If you want them to feel tall you shoot them from below. This must have been when we were 14 or 16 years old, but I still remember some of those lessons that she explained to me back then. I do think about that when I'm trying to set a shot up: The boys are doing this, we should probably be tight up for it. A lot of it is from watching movies and TV, and commentaries – getting to listen to the actors and directors and producers talk about their process, you remember that. That's where that comes from
CWS: Do you have ambitions to get into the field?
That would be a no. (Laughs)
CWS: You don't want to hit the Plastic!Bigtime?
No. I'm happy in my little plastic world with my little plastic boundaries, I don't want to break the plastic ceiling. I'm happy where I am. Once upon a time I thought it would be fun to do Plastic!Winchesters: The Movie, and have it be this epic – take them outside, off the cat-stand, have them go other places and see if I could do a long arcing thing. I don't think I'll have the time to do it. Right now the episodes are manageable with my schedule. If I ever got to the point where my life got too busy, I would have to scale back. Doing it every week can sometimes get a little much., knowing that I have a deadline of Wednesday, and if I miss that deadline I have people saying, "Where's the episode, I'm here, I'm waiting!" That's another thing they had said on the postcard – "We like that you do it every single week." It's like clockwork: It's Wednesday night, it's 9pm, our episode is up.
CWS: I have no idea how you motivate yourself to do this. I know it's fun, but I'd get to the point where I thought "I could be sleeping!"
Oh yeah, there are moments when it's midnight, and I'm thinking, "I can't get this joke to work, and I would rather be doing a couple different things." Then I think someone might watch this, and they might be having a really crappy day and this might totally make their day and entertain them for 15 minutes, and isn't that worth it? Isn't it worth it to make someone smile like that? That's what keeps me doing this every week.
CWS: Do you ever get any crap from people who do know you do this? Does anyone ever say 'Why are you spending so much time playing with dolls?"
I do get some crap from my parents sometimes. "How old are you and what are you doing?" I think my mother summed it up, saying "Some people have hobbies, and their hobby is knitting or playing tennis or something, You hobby just happens to be a fandom-related activity that happens to be playing with Barbies. As long as it makes you happy and you're having fun with it, be weird, that's fine." They kind of embrace my oddness
CWS: Did you grow up in a geek-friendly family?
Not at all. We were a very sports-oriented family growing up. I was on the tennis team and soccer team growing up, and I was very involved with the school paper and orchestra. I had a lot of different interests, but never fandom. I never went online for anything. Supernatural was the first show I ever sought out anything online for.
CWS: Why?
It's a good question. Something about the brother's relationship made me want to know more. I wanted to know what other people were saying about it. I knew what I thought about it, and my sister also watched the show, so we would discuss it -- as we would with shows since we were growing up -- but I wanted to see what else was out there and what other people were saying. I think the first place I stumbled into was the Television Without Pity message boards. They were talking about the different episodes and the character traits, and I thought, "This is where I want to be." I don't even know how I found LiveJournal from there. I think someone must have linked to something someone had written. I thought "What's this LiveJournal thing?" because I had never even heard about it. I think I was there for six months before I finally got my own, and another three months before I posted something, and then even longer before the whole Barbie thing happened. It's interesting how it snowballed from there.
There's more to come!
Comments
That 15 minutes of laughter is so worth it! And the fact that we know that she feels that way means so much, too. I love that we can enjoy her hobby with her.
Posted by: grrli | October 3, 2007 8:02 AM
I for one appreciate that Wednesday fix of Plastic!Winchester Theatre!
Andy sums up what is best about fandom - creating and entertaining out of pure love of the show & characters. And for us grateful fans of course!
Posted by: Gillian | October 3, 2007 3:08 AM
Rock on, Andie! She has made my day so many times with all her humor and silliness and details and creativity. Can I be Andie when I grow up?
Posted by: VengefulMuppet | October 2, 2007 7:50 PM
OMG I love P!WT and it is the bright point of my entire week! Trista and I count down until it is up :D
Posted by: Keshia | October 2, 2007 6:24 PM
I love the plastic!winchesters! Even though I still have crappy dial-up, I'll sit at my computer for hours waiting for the new episodes to load. (Or I try to catch it the next day at work, but it's less explaining to watch it at home...)
So, here's one person who's had a crappy day saved by Andie! And I do so appreciate all the work she and her crew puts into it.
Posted by: khek | October 2, 2007 11:26 AM
I love it!
Posted by: Bambi | October 2, 2007 6:14 AM
Yay for Andie again!
It's really amazing how much time she spends making those episodes every week and how much time and effort she's putting into the musical episode. Sometimes I think I take her hard work for granted, but I'll say that when I'm having a really awful day and things just seem to suck everything always seems better when I go online and see there's a new PWT episode.
Posted by: gabby | October 1, 2007 9:55 PM