Jennifer Aspen – Los Angeles, RIGHT NOW

Q) How did the idea for the series “Los Angeles, RIGHT NOW” come about?

A) I’ve been told several times throughout the years, “You’ve got to do your own webseries!” So, I would think about what it could be. I could never find an idea and there was never an idea that was pitched to me that aligned for me, in my mind. I do a Christmas benefit show every year and I was directing this year. I was coming up with sketches and they were like, “You have to be in the show. You can’t not perform!” I thought about what I could do and we came up with this sketch within an hour, performed it and it killed! About a month later, I saw everything with clarity how this could be a webseries. I figured out how I could do it simply, do it my way, do it a way I thought was really funny and use all the original people that were a part of the sketch. I could pick what the storylines would be and what I wanted to do. It was just totally obvious to me that this was it. It was really just an easy thing. With the Internet, it’s so amazing that you can do anything that you want. It’s the Wild West and if you decide you want to make something, you can totally do it! I had this wonderful writer named Christopher Smith and I said I wouldn’t do it without him and, luckily, he was interested! My husband has an online production company called Captive and I told him we could shoot this, do all the music and edit it. I made it easy for everyone. I call it a mini-webseries because it is six episodes with its own arc. They are only three to four minutes in length, each one. They have a very specific, quick editing style that is really funny and simple to watch and share. And I break into song every episode!

Q) You didn’t get to sing on “Glee,” but you at least get to sing on your show!

A) I’m friends with some really incredible singers. I can sing badly in a really funny way. My costar on the show, Kelly Meyersfield, is a trained soprano and a gifted comedian. She can actually sing well. We do a duet every episode.

Q) Please talk about the creation of your character Evelyn Stanhope.

A) Even though I wasn’t thinking of creating a character that was like this person or that person, I think when you see her all together she is like a combination of Will Ferrell as Ron Burgundy and Annette Benning of American Beauty. Not that I was thinking that, but as we were doing it, a lot of the camera crew would say, “She’s like a combination of…” Certainly there is a lot of self importance and glamour about what she is doing that you could see in a Kathy Lee Gifford and certainly there is some Barbara Walters in there.

Q) How can fans provide their support to get more than six episodes?

A) This is a real test for this. I can easily make more series. This six episode format worked really well with the songs that I wanted to sing. I had a list of songs I thought would really go along with the story that we tell over the six episodes. It was really a complete season the way the story read. To me, I think this is so funny and so great that I am just going to put them all out there at once. They are all going to be available Wednesday, May 28th. Then, I’ll see. If people love it as much as I do then I will completely make more. I feel like I am making this out of the joy of making something funny that I want to humor people and I hope they really find it funny. I hope they want their friends to see it because it just makes you laugh. If it is like that, then I will completely make this until eternity. I can play Evelyn Stanhope all day long.

Q) Where can people go online to watch episodes?

A) It’s just on YouTube! I have taken some meetings with some other companies to host it. What they kind of wanted in exchange or what would have to happen in exchange for it I wasn’t wanting to do because I wanted this to sort of be for the fans. I didn’t want to have to put advertising on it. I didn’t want to do all those things. I just wanted it to be an accessible thing for people to enjoy. We did so much in house that the people who are doing it are all people I know, love the project and just want to be a part of it. The way I shoot it is in such a way that it doesn’t take too much time from their lives so people can do it out of passion and not worry about money. The monetary part of it is taken out of the equation. It’s just something truly fun and creative. I wanted to keep it like that. Also, if you would distribute it on certain channels that would have done it I don’t think their programming or content really felt like a fit for it. It just made sense to independently stick it up on YouTube.

Q) The show even features a cameo from Catherine Bell!

A) When she heard I was doing this, she called me up and said, “Please can I come be on the show!” I told her, “Absolutely!” So, we found a really funny thing for her to do. She is so funny in this part that it made for a really, really fun episode. I think it’s the fifth episode. She just wanted to do it for fun. Everyone who wanted to be a part of it just did it for fun. I did just hear from Kristin Chenoweth and she asked, “When can I be on?” She wasn’t in town while we were shooting. So, maybe in season two. I promised her that I could make it happen. Kristin winces every time I sing though. She says to me very nicely, “Please don’t sing.” I don’t know if she’ll be able to do an episode during this thing where I sing as loud as I can right in her ear.

Q) Besides the humor, what else do you hope fans take away from watching the series?

A) I just want people to laugh until they cry. I want it to be that they just have to show it to other people because it’s just so good. It’s like that panda sneezing. I watched it over and over again and laughed harder each time. I couldn’t stop talking about it to others. The reason I wanted other people to watch it is because I wanted people to enjoy laughing as hard as I was laughing. I think that for this mini webseries I really wanted to make something that was so easy to enjoy, in terms of telling a story. It was quick, easy to enjoy, really fun and easy to share with other people. I wanted to capture how we share funny videos with each other, but in a webseries way that tells a story. That’s really what I wanted to accomplish here.

Q) What are other upcoming projects you can tease fans?

A) I’ve done two pilots in the last couple pilot seasons. We just got word that the last one that I did will not be a series. Though I’ve been shooting television for people, it isn’t making it to air. Then, I have two films that are going into festivals. So, a lot of the work I have been doing is not easily accessible. That’s another great reason to have this webseries. I have to follow up with the film Home and the movie Nowhere Girl. Both of those films should be going into festival circuits. They could end up in a format that people can watch!

Watch The Teaser: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOogHt4fiD4