Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

To kick off Geek Musical Week, Prodigeek speaks to Joss Whedon about his upcoming internet, musical, superhero series, Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog coming to a website near you next week. The creator of Buffy and the Buffy musical episode, “Once More, With Feeling,” Whedon already has a classic Geek Musical under his belt as he tackles the world of new media and internet distribution, something you surely need superpowers to tame. Come back tomorrow for the 2nd part of our Whedon interview.

Prodigeek - Tell me about Dr. Horrible.

Joss Whedon - Well, I can tell you it’s the story of Dr. Horrible, a low-rent super villain trying to make his way in the world, being evil, defeat his nemesis, Captain Hammer, who beats him up on a weekly basis, and work up the courage to talk to the prettiest girl walking around. It basically follows his travails. It’s about 40 minutes, in three acts, and was designed to be just your typical internet, superhero musical.

Prodigeek - What defines the typical internet, superhero musical?

Whedon - I don’t know, I’ve never seen one. It’s supposed to define the typical superhero musical, by being the first one. We’re getting it out before Spider-Man on Broadway. By the way, they are doing Spider-Man on Broadway, you know that, right?

Prodigeek – Yeah, with Julie Taymor and U2. Were there any discussion with them to bring Dr. Horrible to Broadway?

Whedon - There’s been discussion amongst the writers, which are me, my brother Zak, my brother Jed, and Jed’s fiancée, [Maurissa Tancharoen], because that’s what we all want to do, all the time. But first we have to actually make it. That was hard enough; that was pretty daunting.

Prodigeek - Doing Dr. Horrible, you mean?

Whedon - It was completely independent. It was financed by me. So I’m the studio, very exciting. Really, it took a lot of love and a lot of favors so we could actually accomplish it. It was very ambitious, but it was wicked love. Luckily, people like Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion are extremely fun and game and don’t mind the fact that we had no idea what we were doing and only had six days to do it in.

Prodigeek - How much footage did you end up filming?

Whedon - Not much more than we used, because we didn’t have much time and I tend to know what I want. Shot it on DV and we had Ryan Green, Jack Green’s son, lighting it [Editor’s note: Both Jack and Ryan worked on Serenity with Whedon], so it looks a lot like film and it has a pretty traditional look. We tried to make it look professional and show people what you can do for a small amount of money, while, at the same time, always keeping in mind, when the chips were down, and we didn’t have enough footage, this is an internet musical, and we just live with it. I can’t recall every time where I forgot something, just something obvious.

You were talking about wanting to write songs. You’ve obviously done the Buffy musical, contributed to Anthony Stewart Head’s album, wrote the Firefly theme song. Where did this musical interest and this need to write songs come from?

Whedon - Well, I’ve always been a musical fanatic, in terms of loving musical soundtracks. But I never learned how to play an instrument or learn how to sing. But it’s always been…my father wrote lyrics for musicals and so did his father, before becoming television writers. Our whole family grew up on a diet of Sondheim and 70’s rock. So that’s sort of what you’ll hear as a template. Jed actually fronted a couple of bands. He can actually play many instruments and he scored some independent movies and video games, so he has the whole orchestrating thing. He’d write some of the songs, I’d write some of the songs, and he make them sound like they were all one piece. But yeah, writing a song is a glorious feeling because then somebody can sing it, which is is the prettiest thing in the world. But it’s also so compact. You can have a whole journey and you don’t have to write 120 pages and wait for a studio to sign off on it, develop it, and ruin it. It’s like letting off steam.

Prodigeek - Your work’s always been geared towards fantasy and sci-fi. Is that a coincidence or is that where you wanted to be?

Whedon - It’s never “This will work with this!” I love what I love. They seem to go together. Dr. Horrible seems like a no-brainer for me because superheroes are already one step removed from people. So it’s easier for people to watch a superhero movie, especially if they’re singing, than it is for them to watch people singing and accept that it’s going on.

People love musicals. All people love musicals. Most of them don’t know it or can’t admit it. The trick on Buffy was nobody on Buffy wanted to be in a musical. They were forced to sing. Once you had that, the audience could accept it. The audience had the same feeling, “Why is Buffy singing? Oh wait, that’s pretty.” And they’re bigger than life. It is a bigger than life world, and there are superpowers and heroes and villains.

How would you describe the musical tone of the series?

Whedon - When I said a combination of Sondheim and 70’s rock, I actually wasn’t totally kidding. The influences would probably be Sondheim and Neil Young. Jeb is enormously talented and probably has a slightly wider pallet than I do. His stuff is very beautiful and poppy and he make mine sound similar. We went for a sound that was modern, engaging, and poppy, not so poppy that it sounded cheesy, but at the same time, when Captain Hammer sings, it sounds cheesy. We didn’t want to do a pastiche, where every song was a different kind of genre, the way Buffy was. We wanted to songs that sounded nice, that were melodic, a little challenging, but easy to get into with lyrics that worked like a musical. We wanted them to progress. The thing about pop is that it’s about repetition. So if you take the sound of one and the lyrical structure of the other, you basically get what we got.

Prodigeek - You were talking about Sondheim and Neil Young, what big musicals have really shaped your ideas?

Whedon - I can’t choose one. They are the books of the bible for me. I grew up memorizing them one by one as they came out. They all had an enormous influence on me. The influence is so pervasive. I’m never gonna come close to what [Sondheim] does, nor do I try, but I really just try to structure things - the way he structures things influences me.

Prodigeek - Any songs from Dr. Horrible that you think will be breakaway pop hits?

Whedon - I didn’t really think about it. What’s lovely is that when people watch it, everybody responds to a different number. They’re all written to further the story, which doesn’t really help a breakaway pop hit. If I had to choose one, I might choose “Penny’s Song”. She has a ballad that’s so pretty. I think that might work.

Prodigeek - What are your favorite lyrics for the show so far?

Whedon - Oh, I don’t want to give them away. They’re mainly my favorite lyrics that I’ve ever written. They come in a Captain Hammer song. I wrote one verse that came together, very beautifully. It’s so much better to hear Nathan say it than me, so I’m just gonna have you watch for Captain Hammer’s inspirational song in Act 3.

Prodigeek - You say you can’t sing, what part do you sing, if you ever try?

Whedon - I sing them all, and my wife is very kind about that.

Come back tomorrow for Part 2 of our interview with Joss Whedon.