An Evening of Alton Brown: Backstage | Part 1

0:00 I've actually had these nightmares all my life.

0:02 It's like opening night of a play and I'm

0:04 in the play but I don't know the script.

0:07 And finally, I shared this with my wife and she said, "Well,

0:12 you're the only one in the play, so what does it matter?

0:45 I always tell myself I'm done touring.

0:48 Okay,

0:47 this is it.

0:51 But yeah, you said that five years ago.

0:53 I know.

0:53 I know.

0:54 This is it, though.

0:57 This is it.

1:00 Yes.

1:00 Some plays do previews, right?

1:02 Like we're playing in Skenctity for a month to get it worked out.

1:05 We don't get that when you're doing a pack show, performing arts center show.

1:09 You get like maybe two days to build.

1:11 It's called teching.

1:12 It's what we're doing here.

1:13 We're in Wilmington, Delaware cuz we got the Grand Opera House for like

1:17 3 days and we're building the show for the first time.

1:20 We worked all the bits and pieces, but it's never been put together.

1:23 So, you do that, but then when you open,

1:26 there's still like there's a lot of work to do.

1:30 You know, there's there's editing to be done and there's bits

1:33 to be cut or bits to be put in or you realize

1:36 you missed a laugh and so now you've got to go

1:38 in and figure out the laugh and you're working with the audience.

1:40 So, this leg is only three weeks, 14 shows,

1:45 and probably I'll just start to get it right on like the 14th show.

1:49 But if we're going to establish

1:50 that the the Colossal Walk is always going Colossa,

1:54 it's from Colossal Walk.

1:56 See, you name everything mega,

1:57 but I get sick of everything being a mega this and a mega that or jets.

2:00 We have jet fries, jet creams, mega bakes, mega mega walk.

2:07 No, fries.

2:07 I just said it's colossal walk.

2:10 Colossal, but that's what it was before.

2:11 You changed it to colossal walk.

2:12 It was a mega mega bake.

2:13 Mega bake.

2:14 The mega bake and the mega

2:15 the mega bake.

2:16 That's it.

2:17 Just the mega bake.

2:17 Yeah.

2:17 Yeah.

2:18 Well, this should be the mega walk then.

2:19 I thought I'd already had two.

2:20 You did know.

2:21 You're confusing me.

2:22 No, absolutely not.

2:23 I promise.

2:24 It was the Mega Walk and then I changed it

2:25 to the Colossal Walk because I thought we'd already had two megas.

2:28 But if we've only had one mega.

2:31 Yeah.

2:30 Then we can make it We can make it Yeah, because then it was the Astrop.

2:33 It was the Astrop.

2:35 Astrop.

2:35 And then the Jet Fry.

2:36 Jet Fry.

2:37 Okay.

2:37 It's a Mega Walk.

2:38 So then we bring in the Mega Walk already in its its hot configuration.

2:41 And then only once that's out will um the volunteer come.

2:46 Okay.

2:46 All the moving pieces get crossed up.

2:49 Yes, I know.

2:49 Uh the Jet Cream was a hit before, but it's been completely modified.

2:54 It's been completely redone and special things um going into it.

2:59 Uh I I'm not going to say because I don't want to give it away,

3:01 but um but the the mega walk is What are you doing out here, man?

3:10 For this I'm doing um I'm the production manager and then I also do uh lighting.

3:16 I'm also doing sound.

3:17 I'm also I'm doing everything.

3:18 I do all the technical aspects of it.

3:20 This is like whatever their house arrangement is.

3:23 So whatever they use I'm just going to use.

3:26 Okay.

3:26 So you go off based off of how they're set up in their rigs.

3:30 Yep.

3:30 So most theaters have the same lights.

3:34 Yeah.

3:34 I took all those hats and put it into one.

3:36 It's an evening with Alton Brown.

3:38 It's supposed to be a little bit more low-key um vibe, not a TED talk,

3:43 but that's kind of how I sell it to venues and stuff like that.

3:46 Is my volunteer ready?

3:48 Please, please come out.

3:49 Hello.

3:50 What is your name?

3:52 Christie.

3:51 Can I do this right here next to this or do

3:53 I have to go in front which seems unnatural?

3:57 Okay.

3:57 Christie, uh where are you from?

3:59 Salt Lake City.

3:59 What do you do?

4:02 Marketing.

4:03 Are you my boss?

4:06 No.

4:05 Well, yes.

4:06 I mean, this concept was meant to be scaled back from his really big productions

4:11 that we've done where we've had a truck full of gear and equipment and props.

4:18 Um, you know, I thought this was going to be

4:20 Alton walking back and forth on stage just telling stories.

4:24 And somehow we've have a jet cream out here and we have a mega

4:28 walk and it looks like he's a school teacher at his little bench, workbench.

4:34 Um so he's he's delivering a really great show

4:38 with this place enough gives you enough room to come down around.

4:41 Yeah.

4:41 It also it also gives um Travis kind of like one main point

4:46 to to which would I make your life easier.

4:49 Yes.

4:48 Then by all means, you know,

4:50 I would love if this look was a little different from that look because it's hot

4:54 and I would love that to be cold.

4:56 So red, blue, you know, um and then just white when that thing is is down here.

5:01 I'll make it.

5:02 Disco, we cook.

5:04 Volunteer will be here.

5:05 I'll be here.

5:06 Blah blah blah blah blah blah.

5:07 Camera work.

5:08 Is that okay?

5:09 Is that okay?

5:10 The position.

5:10 I'll put it up.

5:11 Yeah, he'll put it up.

5:11 But I The last time I saw it, it was okay.

5:14 Yeah.

5:14 Okay.

5:14 You were good with it where it was because we never talked about it.

5:17 But I can't promise you it's not going to get something.

5:19 I don't care about that.

5:20 I'll clean it.

5:21 I'll clean it.

5:23 That's the hardest working man I know.

5:25 When you work with somebody that writes, directs, produces, stars,

5:32 you start to understand, you know, there's a lot that goes into everything.

5:38 was interesting.

5:39 Actors have it so good because actors get

5:42 to park being themselves and they take on these identities

5:46 and they're that identity for a while and maybe

5:48 they make a lot of money being that identity,

5:52 you know, maybe uh you know, Johnny Depp,

5:54 Jack Sparrow, you know, sorry, Captain Jack Sparrow.

5:58 Um that that's probably just a wonderful thing to be able to park yourself,

6:02 put on another face, go do this personality and um make a lot of people happy.

6:07 Um, but when you're in, you know,

6:09 like the food space as they call it or lifestyle,

6:12 whatever, you are playing yourself.

6:16 You're not being yourself.

6:17 That would be disastrous.

6:18 I think some people try to do that.

6:20 Um, I noticed really early on, like in the first season of Good Eats,

6:28 that I was creating an avatar.

6:32 The avatar looked a lot like me.

6:35 avatar sounded a lot like me, but it wasn't.

6:39 And even right now, I think talking because I'm talking to a camera,

6:44 it's the avatar again because the avatar is what

6:47 I use whenever I'm talking to a to a camera.

6:50 Doesn't mean that the avatar is lying.

6:52 It just means that it's a pro it's a protective layer.

6:54 It's a prophylactic.

6:56 I am wearing a personality condom so that I don't get infected.

7:02 But you do that because you know you got to protect yourself and and people

7:04 that don't people that like fall for it

7:07 that that actually it's them 100% of the time.

7:11 That's just that's dangerous.

7:12 That's a very dangerous place to be

7:14 because you're never quite protecting yourself.

7:17 My wife whenever I do it refers to it as him.

7:20 She'll say you're being him.

7:24 It's the little things.

7:32 Well, actually, there are no little things.

7:33 Everything's a big thing.

7:34 Everything's mission critical until you've done it 20

7:39 times and then not so much, you know, and all the food, you know,

7:46 is locked in refrigerators and freezers down underneath here.

7:49 So, you know, climbing in there,

7:50 you don't want to do that if you have to, but you do.

7:54 I do culinary prep tomorrow.

7:56 Got to do slicing and dicing for the walk demo,

8:00 but I don't want to do it tonight.

8:03 Nope.

8:05 And of course, I had to remember the code.

8:13 Go home.

8:19 Go away.

8:39 What's up, Todd?

8:40 How you doing?

8:40 Good.

8:41 How are you, Cole?

8:42 Morning, too.

8:43 Morning two.

8:44 Checking all the lights, making sure everything's connecting well.

8:48 our mock got 11 th000 watt park cans.

8:52 Some of them have uh super narrows in them.

8:55 Four of them have narrows in them.

8:58 We'll get the walk to about 700° on the sides.

9:01 It'll stick around more like 450 500 center will

9:04 get to about 750 oil and just start walking away.

9:08 And here we're going to have our ingredients so

9:10 that way they can dump each ingredient in oil.

9:13 Our rice got some extra chopsticks for to test and taste.

9:19 All this goes in together.

9:20 Lid goes on top.

9:21 Goes back in the truck.

9:22 Easy.

9:23 Easy.

9:24 Todd's not normal cuz this is my my longest living collaborator.

9:34 He's he worked on every single episode of Good Eat since 1999.

9:39 Everyone.

9:39 never made a show without him,

9:41 even though he almost killed me a couple times cuz I pissed him off so bad.

9:45 Um, and he's done every single tour.

9:49 And he is a different person when he's on tour than when he is on set.

9:53 He He literally morphs into this other person.

9:57 It's a person with the same skills, but applied differently.

10:01 And I recognize him.

10:02 I'm like, "Yes, that's Todd, but that's Tour Todd.

10:05 There's Ter Todd and there's set Todd.

10:08 two completely different talents and I don't

10:10 pretend to know either of them intimately.

10:12 Like I've never sat him down and said, "Todd,

10:14 what makes you tick?" I don't I don't know.

10:15 I don't look I don't poke the bear.

10:17 It was like, "Thank you, Todd.

10:20 Love you.

10:20 Here's your pay." You know,

10:22 like he does it and he's always there and has never let me down once.

10:27 I will never forget we had a huge argument

10:29 and this is the silliest thing in the world,

10:30 but we did a a shot where we were trying

10:33 to go through the center of the earth for him going down.

10:36 I can't remember if we were going from the US to Japan, whatever it was.

10:39 And we had a huge argue about if he went through the center

10:42 of the earth when he came out the other side everything would be upside down.

10:44 And I had the whole thing like, no,

10:46 at some point you would have to turn because you would be going down and then

10:49 at some point you'd have to be going up so it would be right side up.

10:51 Which led to a huge me going fine,

10:53 I'll build everything on this set upside down if that makes you happy.

10:56 And it did.

10:57 And it did.

10:58 I was right.

10:59 But this is how I spend the majority of my days.

11:06 trying to uncoil tangled tiny wires.

11:12 You can coil it up perfectly when you put it in the box,

11:15 but it will always come out like this.

11:17 Found it.

11:19 Yeah.

11:19 Where was it?

11:21 I used to get really angry about it.

11:31 Yeah.

11:32 Will you be following me the whole time, Paul?

11:36 The one thing about being on camera for decades

11:40 as yourself is it does keep you kind of honest.

11:43 You did those things.

11:44 You said those things.

11:46 You that that was you or your avatar, right?

11:50 And you're responsible for your avatar.

11:52 So there's there's an honesty there.

11:54 you don't get to you can only recreate yourself in a certain box.

12:04 But it was also a really interesting period because let's face it,

12:06 people that decided to make food shows became way too important.

12:10 For a good decade, it was ridiculous uh the the notoriety

12:15 that was given to just people because they could cook food.

12:23 Move to the airport.

12:29 So this cocktail, I'd like to have a little bit more of my voice in here.

12:58 So, this is a very important conference part I think

13:00 five about the pre-show video and the music of the pre-show,

13:04 which is really what this whole show is about.

13:06 Let's listen to just fine.

13:10 It's going to be loud.

13:10 People are going to be saying that, you know,

13:13 this conversation's been going on

13:16 all day long about the pre-show video, the music on the pre-show video,

13:20 all the rest of this stuff.

13:21 It's okay.

13:22 I'll work with you.

13:23 Come see the show.

13:24 Once the show starts, you just go home cuz the good part's over.

13:28 You good?

13:29 You got it.

13:29 You got us in nature.

13:32 Look at the two chimp pansies fighting.

13:35 You're not chimpanz You're just like the conversation about the uh about

13:46 Did you throw poop?

13:51 So, we'll just be finishing the AI section.

13:58 Sometimes this is all about just not getting sued

14:02 by someone with a massive legal department like certain food manufactur.

14:09 So, may I?

14:10 Yes.

14:10 Hey, Travis.

14:11 Here we go.

14:12 Here we go.

14:13 Pringles potato chips.

14:15 Pringles potato chips.

14:16 Of course, absolutely positively everyone of them

14:19 is exactly the same as the others.

14:21 Designed that way so that they have uh more

14:23 strength when they're stacked and won't break and shipping.

14:25 They're all exactly the same.

14:26 So, what they started to do is they

14:28 started to feed Pringles to the uh the testers.

14:35 Can you even hear that?

14:36 Or you have to turn it up.

14:37 I can eat two at a time though.

14:39 Right.

14:41 Same touch.

14:44 And sometimes they turn the amplifier up.

14:49 Remember the test subjects didn't know there was an amplifier, right?

14:52 They turned it up and sometimes they turned it down.

14:56 And then they asked the test subjects,

14:58 this is very difficult to do without a beverage.

15:01 Now I already drank my martini.

15:04 They asked the subjects look me if something bad happens up here.

15:07 They asked the subjects to rate the taste and the freshness of the potato chips.

15:14 And guess what?

15:15 Every single test subject said that the quieter potato

15:18 chips were not as fresh and didn't taste as good.

15:23 It's easy to just add stuff.

15:25 It's easy to get another bus.

15:27 It's easy to get another 18-wheeler.

15:29 You know, bigger bigger things.

15:31 You know, in our last the last tour, which was my last tour,

15:34 you know, we built a 27 foot long steam powered hot dog baker.

15:40 Why?

15:41 I mean, it served story, I thought.

15:48 But now I'm obsessed with this idea of like

15:50 going the unplugged route and having very little.

15:54 And we still have two two demos that are very unusual devices.

15:59 Um, very unusual.

16:01 It is unusual.

16:02 There are not a lot of shows like this that play performing arts centers.

16:07 He is a mad scientist when it comes to putting this show together.

16:12 No other I don't I don't know of any

16:14 other person that's doing this type of show.

16:19 If we put this on a t-shirt for the show and an evening by me

16:25 elegant evening of brown We got two head dogs and monster trucks like spins.

16:36 That's how we're going to get the crowd.

16:39 Monster trucks here.

16:41 The problem is that we're so easy

16:42 to entertain that America's not that easy to entertain.

16:47 Guys,

16:50 fishing.

16:55 This is This is the dangerous end.

16:56 All right.

16:56 Is everybody here ready?

16:59 All right.

17:04 Five, four, three, three, two, one, go.

17:12 13.

17:15 9 8 7 5 4 3 2 1 Release.

17:26 Everybody okay?

17:27 But that's uh that's science.

17:29 Sometimes a cruel mistress.

17:31 Here we go.

17:33 Here we go.

17:34 Oh, yeah.

17:35 Oh, I can Can you smell the fish?

17:37 Yeah.

17:38 Do you like fish, Gretchen?

17:39 And I should have asked this probably did this.

17:41 You do like fish.

17:42 Do you like smoke fish?

17:45 You do.

17:46 Okay.

17:47 Okay.

17:53 So, um, on a scale of 1 to 10, would you say this is delicious?

17:56 I would SAY IT'S DELICIOUS.

17:58 DELICIOUS.

17:58 THANK YOU, GRETCHEN.

18:00 Thank you so much.

18:01 Uh, we'll let you uh finish your ice cream

18:03 in the privacy of the back where, uh, you can shower.

18:06 Uh, just follow my attorney out.

18:08 The Jet Cream, everyone.

18:09 Jet Cream 4000.

18:11 Yay.

18:14 One of our finest.

18:15 uh not quite ready for the franchise opportunity

18:20 that I was hoping to offer you this evening.

18:23 Ended up harvesting everything from this end.

18:25 It's just there was a lot of big puddle of liquid in there.

18:27 Yeah, I think what I'm doing maybe switch out my doubleator singleator.

18:32 So, not as much liquid goes in there.

18:34 Get more CO2 in there, less liquid in there.

18:38 You know what I'm saying?

18:39 Well, that's fine unless the ratio stays the same.

18:42 Now, it should stay pretty much the same.

18:43 I just think I think it comes out so quick that maybe I'm overpowering

18:46 to the CO2 where if I have less water out still 15 seconds I'll freeze it up.

18:52 That's my theory.

18:54 Well, we're not going to do it again before the non night show.

18:56 So, make whatever change you like and we'll just deliver it.

18:59 But I got enough out.

19:00 I mean you got enough out.

19:02 But I think I can How we doing and why are we waiting?

19:20 So good.

19:26 No pressure.

19:41 Is that thing a trash can?

19:44 There's like a trash can thing.

19:45 It's trash can.

19:46 It's a trash can.

19:47 It's made for airports.

19:49 So when they have to have transparent stuff,

19:51 but it's super hightensil plexiglass.

19:54 Yeah, we're making ice cream in a trash can.

20:00 Every tour we've done,

20:01 I think at least one thing has malfunctioned at least once.

20:04 Some of them a little bit more dramatic than others.

20:06 I won't go into that.

20:07 Uh, others have been simple stuff that no

20:08 one in the audience would ever know it failed, but I knew it failed.

20:11 I knew it didn't do what it was supposed to do.

20:13 That's the nice thing about live theater.

20:15 The audience doesn't know what they don't know.

20:17 You know, only I knew it went wrong and he knows it went wrong.

20:19 And then all you do is figure out how to fix it.

20:23 Not too many theaters still have like him walking the flies.

20:30 You don't see ropes like this very often.

20:33 Really?

20:36 old house.

20:39 I used to be obsessed old tours, right?

20:42 I don't do this anymore.

20:43 I would steal these rail pins.

20:46 I would What would you do with them?

20:53 Collect them.

20:56 Don't you judge me?

21:03 I'll be back.

21:03 I have to go get a bag of frozen peas and carrots.

21:09 Now that I've shown you that, I can't steal them.