Drop everything. The McDonald's Creamy Parmesan and Baking Quarter Pounder is back for a limited time. So juicy, so cheesy. This burger demands your full attention.
Made with 100% Canadian beef, topped with the Creamy Parmesan and black pepper sauce, hickory smoked bacon and crispy onions. Oh yeah, try the Creamy Parmesan and Baking Quarter Pounder today. Or treat yourself to your dream burger lineup with our original Quarter Pounder with cheese or Quarter Pounder BLT. At participating McDonald's restaurants in Canada, product availability varies by restaurant.
Some things are better when they're kept simple. Like Simply Lemonade, meat with real lemons and cane sugar, giving you a fresh, all-natural taste that shines through in every sip. It's the kind of drink that turns an everyday moment into something a little more special. Bright, refreshing, and crafted for people who appreciate the real thing.
Visit the Jill Juice aisle in your local grocery store today and say yes to Simple. Horror Movie Night listeners, welcome back to a main feed, but not your regular show episode of Horror Movie Night. I'm Kyle, and you know that this is special when Matt's not doing the intro, right? We had a great response to our friend Toby coming on.
Obviously, I know when Matt goes out into the world and does interviews and talks to other filmmakers and creatives, it's always a good time. So I am happy to bring on my friend, funny man, creative person, lover of life. My friend Ronald Short is here to chat with us. Say hello, Ronald Short.
Hey, thanks for having me, Kyle. I do love life. Yeah, man. Well, I met you two and a half years ago now at Chattanooga Film Festival, which I talked about at length even on the show, on the podcast, in our Patreon, and I've likely mentioned your short while we were there.
But we not only just attended, we lived together for a few days. We spent a lot of time down in Chattanooga, which is a great festival. We had a lot of time together down there, and that is one of the many places that you have been with your films. So give the listeners just a little bit of a rundown of what you're about, and I want to stop when you get the body because I want to talk about that body just a little bit.
Okay, yeah. So I'm a writer, director, actor, puppeteer in Austin, Texas. I used to live in Indiana, but I moved down here 16 years ago almost in December. It would be 16 years.
16 years? You've been down here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 16 years. It's been a long time now.
I've seen a lot of change. But, yeah, so I came down here in 2009 and really started making stuff here in 2010 and beyond. I made several shorts, a couple features. My last one was Good Feels on Wheels.
It's a little rom-com that we're actually going to release next year finally. Oh, that one's so much fun. A quick shout out to Good Feels on Wheels. That thing made me laugh out loud.
I'm so glad it's going to get a home here. That's fantastic. I appreciate that, man. Thank you.
Thank you. And then horror-wise. So I've always been a comedy guy, and I've also loved horror the whole time. So my genres are definitely, as a filmmaker, comedy and horror, and then sometimes a mixture of the two.
But comedy is always cheaper to make because you don't need a lot of facts, just mostly dialogue, maybe some slapstick here and there. But, yeah, so horror was always something that I couldn't do until I got to it. I felt like, I did a little bit in college, you know, but I'm somebody who likes to do it right when I try to do it right, try to do it as well as I can, so I never really tried to bite off more than I could chew. But when I moved to Austin, I really got, I found some people who were just as into horror as I am, and we made some shorts, Breaking and Entering.
We made The Rink, which played a few places in 2020 during the pandemic, and Body, that you wanted me to bring up, Body. Yeah, yeah. Last one we completed is a short film, a short horror comedy, but yeah, that one played a few places. Yeah, I feel like Body's just a good place to talk about your upcoming project.
But Body is, and we met, it's a great place and a great short that really has both the comedy and the horror chops, and doing it on the shoestring to no budget that we talk about as, it's one of my favorite things to talk about as a filmmaker perspective on this podcast, is to talk about this stuff. On the show, we're big proponents of things like Troma, and Matt, our co-host, loves the full moon stuff, which is a certain style of low budget, but it's a certain approach to that level. But even beyond, we talk about movies that are usually 10 years or older on our show, so we are starting to get more into seeing all budget strength, and then as I go out onto the circuit, I get to kind of see what everybody else is doing and what everybody else's flavors are. So yeah, you came off The Rink, which The Rink is available to see online.
Is that right? Rink's available online. Is Body available yet or not yet? It is, yeah.
That one's actually available on two streaming platforms, Laugh After Dark and Unholy TV, which is, they're on YouTube now, but they're going to be doing streaming things. Body is great, and not only do we like indie filmmaking and filmmakers that have very sort of specific voices, I think one of the things that we get bogged down in is style over substance or style over just substance, but just something. Style over something, right? Style over everything.
Style over everything. God bless it, right? Yeah. That style over substance is something that I have, I never wanted.
I've always wanted substance. And I think for upcoming, this is just advice for people who want to start filmmaking. If you want to start filmmaking, focus on your story, your script, and your characters, camera should come, not last, but not first. Certainly later.
Later in the process. Yeah. I think it's got to be story. I mean, my stuff, to be honest, I always focused on that stuff first, so my stuff didn't, like, I was going for, like, not cinematically, like, I mean, Kevin Smith wasn't a very cinematic filmmaker, but he was very influential on me.
And then people like Larry David doing Caribbean Enthusiasm with, like, a fucking DD take the first season. That stuff was what really influenced me. So, yeah. I'm very much, find the substance first.
Yeah. I mean, I think that's a great thing to really shine a light on even more so now. I think, like, when the big thing that we continue to dance around in our creative lives, I would imagine, is the use of AI. And it's not just our creative lives.
It is everything. The humanity of it all. The humanity of it all. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. That's right. That's right.
And then you emphasize that with all those other things. A sound design, nobody would expect, or a camera move, or a practical, or something. The way the things look. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. And, like, you did that at a very approachable and acceptable level with Body. Like, you had the idea.
You had your characters. You had your prop. You had, like, the character of the short. And you made it happen, right?
And I feel like you capitalized that on that in your upcoming. And it's not a short. It is a set of episodes. Seriously.
And it's Rose. Tell me a little bit about how that came about on the heels of the shorts and the other projects you were working on prior to that. Yeah. Just a transition from Body.
Body was a great place for me to practice puppetry. Because, I mean, it wasn't a full puppet. I didn't get to build a puppet for that. But I had bought this thing, this Frankenstein, off of eBay.
I searched curse items. And it was right there. And I sent it to my house. And I didn't do anything to it.
I saw it. It was so perfect. I mean, it's like an old school, you know, Halloween decoration. And I felt like if we just built the tension around it, we don't need to make him, like, blood doesn't need to come out of his eyes or some shit.
You know, it just needs to be. I wanted that thing to be creepy. And there's this great shot. Why?
Great shot. I don't know. Don't know. Just hear it.
Hear it. There's a good shot I enjoy in the film. Travis Ward is my DP on pretty much everything. He's always great.
And it's a shot of basically the Frankenstein and its button and the hands coming in to frame to push it. And the buildup to that is one of the most fun things I've experienced with an audience as, like, a filmmaker. So I really enjoyed that film for those reasons. I'm working with all those people, obviously.
And leading into the new thing, I got to use some of the skills I learned there. And honestly, some of the things that I thought about while working on body. Like, I need, you know, things to, not just pillows, to put my knees on the ground. I need to have, like, a thing.
Like, for Tegan and his bros, we got a mechanics cart, you know, so I can lay back and use it. So my assistant director, Kyle Gates, he was pulling me. Sorry, he was pulling me. And, yeah, I would make him look like he was walking.
Tegan. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. Tegan and his bros is a four-episode series. It's a comedy series about two stoners who adopt a cat who happens to also be a stoner.
And he has a lot of thoughts. He's a puppet, very much in line with the Muppets and what they've established in the puppetry world. And, yeah, he's a snarky little dude. Some people have called him a little shit.
It's a part of the little shit genre, which I enjoy. So, yeah, I really wanted to do something with a full Muppet-like puppet. And, yeah, that's Tegan and his bros. We're at some of the Laugh After Dark TV.
Yes, yes. It has a home, so you're not only going to hear us talk about this and then not be able to see it. Luckily, for you, listeners, you will be able to see this. And it's quite a joy.
I think we also love puppets with an attitude here on Bored Rooms as well. So it was nice to see this stoner puppet. I like their little vignettes of the lives of these roommates and their new furry friends. Do you have a cat, Ronald?
Were these drawn from real-life experiences for the most part? Because when I was watching them, they felt truly to me like if I was giving life to the shitty things that my cat does. Right? Like if I was giving an narration to one particular episode that involves a plant.
And, my God, I couldn't. And that was a laugh out loud for me because, as a cat owner, I was like, yeah, that's exactly what happened. Like, plus, but on top of that, the fantastical nature of that cat being a puppet and being able to tell me what his fucking vibe was. It was, yeah, yeah, I love that.
Tell me about what it was like trying to make this stoner cat character. Because you also play it and voice the character. Right, yeah. Yeah, I do have three cats.
And I've had cats my whole life. I like dogs, but I'm much more of a cat person. I just like their vibes more. I like how they're independent.
They don't need you all the time. They've got their own things going on. Because I've got stuff to do, too, you know? So, when I want them on me, they'll come and love on me.
But when I need to work on something, they give me my space, which I appreciate. But, you know, sometimes they don't do that. Sometimes they just invade. If they're in the mood for something, they'll make it happen.
And stuff like that is what really inspired Tegan. My experience as being a pet owner, just thinking about, like, okay, you know, I'm sure as a fellow cat owner, you talk to your cat and have little conversations. And it literally came from, what would they say back? Or, like, what if this little guy talks shit to me or was trying to, you know, really trying to start something instead of just biting or, like, you know, playing with your arm or whatever it is.
What if they got upset? What if they had an opinion? And then I kind of, like, thought about it more. And, like, I'm a stoner and I like stoner comedies.
And I'm really trying to break into the stoner world of comedy. I want people, like, the Cheech and Chong fans, I really want them to check this out and enjoy it. Because we're mixing, like, I've said this in some other interviews. But what I'm trying to tap into with this is, like, what Jim Henson was doing in the 70s and 80s is, like, college kids were watching this stuff along with preschool kids.
It was people in their dorm rooms stoned or drunk, hanging out with friends, watching Big Bird and Elmo or, you know, Kermit and Fozzie or whatever. And I want to tap into that audience. I want to find them. And I want them to see this and, like, put it off for some friends.
Like, it feels kind of like an adult swimmy kind of thing, at least when I was in college. Like, it's a little different these days. But I think it could fit in that world. I don't know.
It's like, like you said, Cheech has only, like, seven minutes at most. And you have to sit down and have a good time with them. That's why. They're great.
They're great little, yeah, they're great little lunchy bites, dude. They really are. Yeah, lunchy bites. Our listenership, I think, will really enjoy that.
So you put together these four episodes. Where can they be found online? Yeah, so they are officially releasing on December 9th, 2025, on Laugh After Dark TV, which is a new comedy streaming platform. They started as a stand-up kind of a show in Las Vegas, which evolved into a film festival, comedy festival, which evolved into now a streaming service.
And we submitted to their first film festival. I mean, it's comedy and film. So, like, stand-up is, like, their primary focus, but they're also focusing on comedy shows and movies and stuff, full links and shorts. And we submitted their first one with a short called Breakfast To Go.
And we just got in with them, the great people, Robert and Kelsey, who run it, are fantastic folks. And we've been to three of the four that they've had so far. We've had a film in three of them. And, yeah, we've just become friends with them.
And they offer this, like, platform to people who submit to their fests and get into the fests. And, like, anybody really can submit their comedy films to the platform. And they will reach out to you if it's a good fit or not. And luckily with us, we've worked out an exclusivity agreement.
It's a little different than just having a thing on the platform. So, yeah, it's exclusive on there for at least a year. And hopefully, yeah, we'll get some traction on it. I love that.
Because I think comedy especially is almost sort of overwhelming to find. Like, you can be scrolling through TikTok or Instagram and find little, like, tidbits, right? But it's hard to all be in, like, one place. So it's great to hear that there's a home for both stand-up and series and films and a place that really kind of brings all that together.
I think comedy needs that. Comedy needs some sort of tastemakers. For sure. That can steer people in that way, in that direction.
Absolutely. And we shot the thing not really knowing where it was going to be at first. Like, we had this idea of charging, like, 99 cents an episode and seeing what happens. But we never really knew what platform to use.
There's a lot of options out there. And, you know, it's kind of hard to do everything independently all the time. Yeah, yeah. We were able to – them launching this platform was just perfect timing for us, to be honest.
And they liked the show and it all just fit. So it was kismet in the best way. That's great. It's happening.
Yeah. It's happening. Yeah. We'll talk a little bit just about that sort of that journey of what had been, like, previously, trying to put your work out there and what it is like now having the assistant to the platform or the support of a streaming service.
Yeah. I mean, everything's better when you have a team of people who know what they're doing behind you and your project. I'm not a marketing person. I didn't really get into this world to market myself and do the whole social media thing.
So I've always just kind of focused on the thing, on the film. And, you know, some people probably think that's to my detriment. I don't know. But I feel like I'm getting better at the films.
So that's all that matters to me. But, yeah, releasing stuff on your own is not easy. You have to spend money on these social media platforms to get people to look at it. It's really hard for me to believe that things go authentically viral anymore when everything's asking you to pay to boost your thing.
So it's just, like, a frustrating time to even have to try to use these things. But it's having this platform. Like, I'm excited for this and hopefully more. You know, you've seen some horror platforms launching in the last couple of years that aren't Shudder.
They aren't, you know, the bigger ones. But they're giving access to smaller films. And people are actually able to make money doing it again. Which, you know, it's not easy to do.
No. I'm not sure we were going to get to that place. Not at all. That's it.
I was a little cynical. But I lived in that world for a minute. I was thinking, like, holy shit. But, no, it's great.
It's easy to get lost in that thought. It is easy to get lost in that. And, you know, stories of what filmmakers done previously is completely different than it was six months, a year, two years, five years ago. Right?
So, you know, in order to figure it out and, you know, being a filmmaker of, you know, many years now, you and I have been through festival circuits. We've tried to put stuff out and just see how, like, we've done different, we've put things out differently just to see what works. So we have to keep doing that and keep seeing what works. And to have people support that is the key.
To have people find a home for those things and be able to point them in that direction, I think, is a very valuable thing. Yeah, absolutely. And I feel like shining a light on that even more. I want them to succeed.
I want Laugh After Dark to be a big thing. So I want more people to send them movies. Why would I try to hide that away from people? I'm filmmaking as a collaborative art.
There's too many people who, I don't know, are out there for themselves and we should all be, I don't know, helping each other out. You and I should. that sentiment from when we first met to now seeing, you know, me seeing your projects and vice versa, just, like, knowing that there are people out there making the thing that you want them to make, and you want them to succeed, you want them to land the spot, you want them to, you want to send people their way, like, it's, it's, supporting your fellow artists is important, so I'm so happy for people to see this again, especially our listenership, I just, so give me, so December 9th is when it drops, Laugh After Dark TV, which is both a browser-based and an app streaming service, so there are multiple ways to approach it. So if you go to their main site, they have ways to sign up for Laugh After Dark TV there, it's in your smart device apps as well, and I think it's on smart TVs, I hope, and then, yeah, beyond that, we have an affiliate link, so if you go to our Instagram, SPI, underscore productions, you can use that, and get a little boost there, so yeah.
Yeah, I'll put that affiliate link in here, so that when you go to sign up for Laugh After Dark, they'll know that, they'll know that Ronald sent you, exactly, exactly. And definitely, yeah, check out the Instagram, you'll see clips, you'll see Teagan in action, like, you'll get it, you'll, as soon as you see this, you'll get an idea of the vibe, and I sincerely hope our listeners will check it out. Congratulations on getting this together and getting it out there, you know, a lot of people will ask what's next, I know better than to ask that, and I want you to ride this wave, and ride in the eye of Teagan and his bros. I want to see more of Teagan and his bros.
Me too, friend, thank you for having me, thank you for promoting it, and yeah, I'm super excited to see what happens, thanks for having me. Want to see your rewards go further? Now at Shell, Steam Plus members can fill up on points at a pump, on snacks, car wash, and more. Plus, Scotiabank and Tangerine cardholders can get up to 10 cents per liter in value with a linked card.
New rewards partners, new ways to save and earn at Shell. Get more, go further. On participating Shell locations, conditions and limits apply, actual value may be lower. Visit shell.ca slash loyalty for full details.
You're listening to the Geek State Network.