Interview with Dean O’Carroll, author of the play, Sally Cotter and the Censored Stone; a review of Harry Potter & Imagination; A reading from Hog’s Head Conversations; Hog’s Head support
On Tap
- Sally Cotter script
- Sally Cotter blog
- Sally Cotter Facebook Group
- For more information or to order Sally Cotter
- Audio clip from the play
- Review of Harry Potter & Imagination
- Support The Hog’s Head (and be entered to win a free book!)
- Potter Pundits Post
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{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Good Pubcast.
On a technical note, I found the talking during the intro music almost indecipherable. Also, there was a significant volume difference between your two voices.
The play sounds like great fun. I appreciated this interview. Thanks.
I think I’ve finally found the problem with the two different volumes of voices, so that should be remedied in the future.
I made some adjustments and uploaded a new file. The sound should be a lot more balanced now.
I didn’t have any problem with the intro music & voice over, understanding it that is. The varying levels of sound between you & Dean was also noticeable but not too distracting. But I see you fixed that, so no one will ever have to suffer through that problem again…on this podcast at least.
Nice interview. Had heard the name Sally Cotter before but didn’t know anything about the play. Very informative. Wish he’d left in the nod to The Buggles though. I’m old enough to get it.
Well, I just finally got smart enough to turn up the input volume on my MacBook, so you shouldn’t have to deal with that sound issue ever again
iTunes users: Are you getting the podcast?
I’ve got it fine, Travis.
Thanks to Travis and to all the listeners. I had a great time doing the interview.
As for the volume problems, maybe I was just shouting. I’m Irish, so I get boisterous in pubs.
Revgeorge — yeah, I enjoy obscure reference humor, too. I just needed to use the word too many times in the play to hinge it on a fairly flimsy joke. I go for obscure stuff in other places. For instance, the equivalent of Ravenclaw house is Raymenburr House. Kind of sad to think Raymond Burr is an obscure reference these days, but I think he is. It’s only mentioned once, in passing, so I don’t mind if it sails over most of my audience’s heads.
If I ever write a sequel to SALLY I intend to include a two-line character based on Dedalus Diggle who speaks only in James Joyce quotes. Get it? Obscure AND pseudo-intellectual!
This was a good pubcast Travis, bit of a change of pace which was nice. I really enjoyed the play, it was more witty than slap happy humor which I really like. I wonder if Dean read Harry Potter and Imagination, because Professor Shifty Shape goes along with the idea of shape shifter archetype. Plus Greg from HPProgs would love all of the ambiguity references. I’ll have to take a look at it again to see how many obscure references I missed.
Brent, Dean wrote it before I wrote HPI, so I’m certain I had no influence on that character. But that was a question I had wanted to ask – whether the “Shapeshifter” archetype played any role in that name choice.
Dean?
Yes, unsurprisingly, the term shapeshifter was on my mind when I named the character. I think I probably worked backwards, though, turning Snape to Shape as a basic play on words, and then Severus to Shiftia so it would make more sense (if it was just “Shape” it would sound like she was supposed to be a “shapely” woman). I liked it because I knew Snape was such an ambiguous character and I wanted to make jokes about how the Shape character loved to point out her own ambiguity, if not literally amorphousness. But I don’t think I was actually thinking of the shapeshifter archetype from mythology. I actually feel like “Shiftia Shape” is not one of my best character names because it’s not especially funny, though, yes, it does have a lot more meaning than something like “Albatross Underdrawers” or “Reubenon Ryebread,” though those much more interesting plays on words. And, of course, for the literal-minded, Shape is not LITERALLY a shape-shifter, in a world where there are literal shape-shifters, and I worry slightly that that might be confusing. Someday I’ll write something with a trickster figure named “Loki Coyote” to please mythological allusion buffs.
(SNEAK PEAK — I’m toying with doing a sequel which would introduce pastiches of the Mauraders who, rather than being “animagi” are “transfurmers” … again, no deep meaning there, but it allows to make a doofy “more than meets the eye” joke. I recently recorded an audio piece about Harry doing stand-up comedy where he says that Professor Slughorn’s ability to become a chair makes him an “Ikeamagus”)
I have not read “Harry Potter and the Imagination” yet. It is on my list … I keep meeting all these damned WRITERS …
This was a great episode, Travis! I’m excited to go read the play, and perhaps bring a monologue from it to my acting class.
It was fun to hear you’d done theater before. I’m a performer, I’m trying to launch an operatic career. Theatrical geeks of the world unite!