Joss Whedon

Exclusive: iF MAGAZINE VISITS JOSS WHEDON’S ’MUTANT ENEMY PICKET DAY’ - PART 1

From BUFFY cast and crew to fans from across the world, everyone was out to support the Writer’s Strike

When Joss Whedon puts out the word that he’d like a little support, a lot of people show up. Witness the turnout when Whedon announced online at Fans4Writers.com and whedonesque.com that he and many of the writers and actors he’d worked with at his Mutant Enemy production company on the TV series he created, BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, ANGEL and FIREFLY, and the movie SERENITY, would be picketing at Twentieth Century Fox on December 7 on behalf of the Writers Guild of America strike.

The location was chosen because Fox is where WGA member and ardent strike supporter Whedon usually pickets. For those unfamiliar with the situation, the strike began in early November when the contract between the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers expired. There are many issues involved, but the chief ones involve payment for use of material by WGA members on the Internet, a television-like medium in which union writers currently receive little or no compensation when their work is shown. Between 400 and 500 fans arrived to bear signs and walk for four hours with Whedon and Co., some of the demonstrators coming from as far away as England and Australia to demonstrate their support of Whedon and the WGA.

The group included FIREFLY/SERENITY stars Nathan Fillion, Morena Baccarin and Alan Tudyk, BUFFY/ANGEL writer/producer Drew Goddard (also a writer on ALIAS, LOST and the upcoming feature CLOVERFIELD), BUFFY potential Felicia Day, SLITHER writer/director James Gunn, Whedonverse comics writer Brian K. Vaughan, and the following actors, writers/producers and fans quoted below.

iF MAGAZINE: At what point did you realize there was this much public support for Mutant Enemy and the WGA strike?

JOSS WHEDON: The people on Whedonesque and the ones who created Fans4Writers and the people who delivered pizza to Jane [Espenson] on the first day [as she was picketing at Universal] – everybody made it pretty clear right up front that they understood what we were fighting for, they believed in it and that they wanted to support us, and not just us, but all the writers.

iF: How did this event happen?

WHEDON: You know, it started out with just, ‘Hey, let’s get some of the writers together.’ And then I think it was Jane who took it a little bit further than that, talked to a couple fans, and then it was like, ‘Well, we’ll announce it,’ and then it ballooned.

JANE ESPENSON (BUFFY and FIREFLY writer/producer, now on BATTLESTAR GALACTICA): I was involved in it – it was Marti Noxon’s idea originally. And Joss picked it up and I helped figure out a date for it and then the people at Fans4Writers helped organize it and look at what happened. This turnout is incredible.

MARTI NOXON (BUFFY showrunner on Seasons Six and Seven, now on GREY’S ANATOMY): I was like, “Hey, we should all march on the same day at the same place!” And then other smarter, more organized people took it over from there. I had a germ of a seed of an idea.

BRENDA LAWHORN (fan organizer): Joss mentioned on Whedonesque.com one day that he would like to think about making a day together, because Fans4Writers.com was started by the Whedonesque people and as the fans, we grabbed hold of that and said, “Okay, we’re not going to miss this opportunity,” and we ran with it and started bugging Joss about it, and next thing you know, we had a date three weeks out so we could plan and get people to show up from all over the country and the world.

ADAM LEVERMORE-RICH (fan organizer – the third fan organizer was Chris Bridges): This was inspired by Joss. He said that he wanted to do something with the Mutant Enemy folks and he wanted to invite the fans, so obviously, when Joss says, “Hey, I’m going to be somewhere, come join me,” a lot of people come join him [laughs]. We already have our Fans4Writers site up and running, so it kind of made coordination a little bit easier. We decided we really should have some specific organization to make sure that people were treating the strike with the proper amount of respect and remembering that it’s not a convention.

iF: What have been the logistics of setting this up?

LAWHORN: Well, basically, posting on the boards, the Fans4Writers board, to get the word out, to get people to come to the board and let us know that they were coming, where they’re coming from and just looking at maps to see where we can meet up and how we can organize ourselves together and march over on Fox as one cohesive group.

iF: What brought you out here today?

DOUG PETRIE (writer/producer/director on BUFFY, now on C.S.I.): This came to our attention through a top-secret email from Joss Whedon about three weeks ago, maybe a month ago. And we were all very excited, we were happy to see one another, and of course we very obviously are fans [of Whedon].

HARRY GROENER (the Mayor on BUFFY): Joss sent an email. My wife and I had been in New York helping a sick friend. The weekend we got back, I think, there was an email and I said, “Well, I think we should do what we can.” I couldn’t do anything in New York – of course, the strike going on in New York, the stagehands’ strike as well – we couldn’t do anything there, what we were doing was just too time-consuming – but we do have a little bit of time out here, so we could come out and help.

HEWARD POWELL-JONES (fan): I’m from Essex, just north of London. I’ve been following the strike from the beginning and thinking it would be nice to come over and support them [the WGA]. As soon as the Joss Whedon day, the Mutant Enemy day, was announced, I thought, ‘Yes, I must come over [to Los Angeles].’ I’ve never gone to a convention, never done anything like that, really. This is a first, because I’m a big fan of Joss Whedon and because I do want to be a writer myself. So two for one.

iF: Do you feel like you’re at a convention?

CAMDEN TOY (Gentleman, Gnarl and Ubervamp in BUFFY; Prince of Lies in ANGEL): No, I don’t. And in fact, I was just talking with one of the fans, who was saying, ‘I don’t want to keep you here, there are lots of other people who want to talk to you,’ and I was like, ‘It’s not a convention [laughs], it’s a protest.’

RON GLASS (Shepherd Book in FIREFLY/SERENITY): Oh, this is totally different [from the Browncoats Cruise, where Glass was a guest speaker]. There’s firm ground you can walk on [laughs]. But the spirit and the heart of these fans is the same.

iF: How many people came straight from the week-long FIREFLY/SERENITY Browncoats Cruise, which came into port yesterday, to this?

LEVERMORE-RICH: That’s a good question. We had close to two hundred on the boat – I’d say, maybe half of them? I mean, we have a lot of folks who came off the boat for it.

MICHAEL FAIRMAN: I was just on the cruise [as a guest speaker], which was a convention of Browncoats, fans from Firefly. I’ve been at several of these [conventions] and the fans are quite vocal in their support of Joss Whedon and the show, and they wanted to show their support for him, and that’s why they’re here.

LYNN BRIANCE (fan): LB: Cruise was amazing. Best convention ever. [On hearing about Mutant Enemy Day], I went, ‘Ah, perfect!’ I’ve taken the whole week off work already, and it worked perfectly.