N.B.: Holy cow.
David X. Cohen: I was right in the middle of the pack, in terms of my mere Master's degree. So, we don't need a lot of outside consultants.
N.B.: No, I guess you don't.
David X. Cohen: We can get the science completely wrong from just within our own ranks. But we'll know it's wrong. That's the difference between us and other shows, is that when we get it wrong, we feel bad about it and we say, well, it's funny so we better go with that, even though it's wrong. A couple of times, for real obscure things, if you want a real nerd note here, sometimes we'll put math references or physics jokes in the background, literally on a blackboard. For example, if the Professor is lecturing, that kind of thing. I have an old friend of mine, David Schiminovich, who is a professor of astrophysics at Columbia [University] now. He has provided several of those kind of things that are real, super obscure jokes. And Sarah Greenwald, who is a professor at Appalachian State University, and gives a lecture on one of the DVD extras, she has provided some as well. So we have called for real obscure math jokes, but not for fact-checking kind of stuff. We're very cocky about our own fact-checking abilities.
N.B.: I confess I did not make it all the way through the math lecture extra on the DVD.
David X. Cohen: To each his or her own. But one thing I will say, I'm proud of that math lecture, in that, whenever you see any reference to math or science in general, on a cartoon especially, but comedies in general, it's always, oh, those nerds and their math. I wanted to do something that purely celebrated math and did not make fun of it. Even though all the things that you talk to me about are our jokes about math and physics. But, you know, to present it as, math can be fun, and we're going to admit that we like math, and if you want to punch us in the face, we're going to stand there and take it. We're going to class up the joint on our dumb cartoon some actual math. But we have plenty of other extras, again, for people who don't like that, who aren't math people.
N.B.: Like Hypnotoad.
David X. Cohen: Hypnotoad, the usual cut scenes.
N.B.: Right, deleted scenes, animatics.
David X. Cohen: Drawings, and all that kind of things. So, plenty of nice pictures to look at if you're not up for a math lecture.
N.B.: It's a great DVD, and I was really excited to watch it. I watched it as soon as I got it.
David X. Cohen: Thank you very, very much. So I guess I should run. One last, wrap-up question.
N.B.: A lot of people email me, who want to submit scripts to Fox, to Matt Groening, to you. I try to explain to them how that works.
David X. Cohen: It's a legal quagmire.
N.B.: Do you have advice for budding writers?
David X. Cohen: They have to get an agent or a lawyer to get their script onto someone's desk, who can take responsibility for it, so there's confidence that they're not going to be accused of stealing a script. Because obviously if someone submits a script that's a parody of 2001, and we happen to already be working on that, we need to protect ourselves. So, as a general policy, we can't even look at scripts that don't come from an official source. And it is kind of a catch 22, where people need to have a script to get an agent. So, all I can say is, keep plugging away and maybe get someone from a different show to look at something. When I was reading scripts for Futurama, I would often prefer to read scripts for other shows because when people submit spec scripts for the show you work on, you're very familiar with all the pitfalls and the problems of that show. Actually, people tend to be less picky when they read scripts for other shows. That's one way to go, even though it's counter intuitive.
N.B.: That's good advice.
David X. Cohen: But the main thing is plug away as much as you can to get an agent or an entertainment lawyer. Then people are much more willing to take a look at things.
N.B.: Thank you for your time, and good luck.
David X. Cohen: Thank you. I hope we can talk longer next time.
