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| Anyone that knows Bill, knows that he is a total hard-ass when it comes to movies. Scientists still are not sure as to which planets must alignin order for him to actually give a film a passing mark. He insists thatit’s not just cynicism, but a sincere belief that we can all do better.“We’ve all settled for a mediocre world of Happy Meals and Disney characters. Is this really okay? We’re drowning in a sea of irrelevance.” (His favorite film is “Network.”) Bill firmly believes that comedy can be one of the most effective and powerful educational tools out there. "You can use it to increase awareness rather than just insult people. Like power tools, you can either build a house, or cut off your hand--you decide." Believing the world is at least a little sick and knowing that laughter is the best medicine, he created “The Couch Critics.” The show is something like “Saturday Night Live” meets “At the Movies.” It’s a movie-review / sketch-comedy show where four real people (not critics) talk about movies (from the couch, of course), and every other second there’s a parody, skit, spoof, gag, or bit to show how ridiculous some of the films are. “Can a bus really jump over a fifty foot missing section of a highway? You do the math!” Bill has been a graphic designer and special effects artist (compositor, animator, photographer) and supervisor for commercial television and several television shows including “The Outer Limits,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” and “The X-Files.” He’s apparently gotten quite tired of doing special effects for everybody else and hangs up the phone when people responding to his Digital Effects listing in the LA 411 directory call about this week’s never-seen-before FX extravaganza. He claims he’s gotten more than a little annoyed at having to “move the UFO a little left....no wait...a little right...hmmm... maybe up....let’s try down....I think it should be green...” and wants to pursue story creation. He breaks-down to do effects only for his own projects. “Chasing after the technology is also really getting old. There’s new software and hardware every other day. Plus, I’ve sort of gotten the spfx “bug” out of my system.....a bug that was placed there long ago when Star Wars first hit the screens. I was just a kid, but I ran right out, got a camera, and started building models and setting the basement on fire. But don’t even get me started ranting about how bad Stars Wars became with Episode One... talk about going to the dark-side! George is now Darth Lucas...more machine than man.” Read Bill's commentary on Star Wars Episode One. His long journey from the basement to Hollywood went way around the block through Purdue University in Indiana where he received both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical and computer engineering. He studied computer graphics and robotics there with the hopes of using them in special effects. The gravitational pull of becoming an engineer nearly proved too difficult to overcome, but he finally achieved escape velocity and broke free in 1991 when he moved to Los Angeles. He executive produced a God-awful film back in 1994 (no, he will not give the title) and, after extensive therapy, decided to become part of the Hollywood solution rather than the problem. Bill wrote and directed "SuperGuy: Behind the Cape," a project he believes is just that step in the right direction. He produced the movie along with fellow Couch Critics Mark Teague, Tim Peyton, and behind-the-scenes critic (editor) Mike Ziemkowski. "SuperGuy" is a mockumentary about the not-so-super life and times of a super hero. "What if there really was a super hero? What would we do to him?!" “SuperGuy was the perfect vehicle for a substantial message wrapped-up in entertainment with social commentary and a scope of humor from high-brow all the way down to the toilet.” Bill's currently bringing that broad scope of humor to a “funny look at pop-psychology” book he’s writing and a stand-up show that he’s developing. |
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