Editor’s note: To mark the May 9-10 farewell episode of Buntport Theater’s live sitcom “Magnets on the Fridge,” which ends after five years and 65 original episodes, Denver Post theater critic John Moore conducted a completely silly, tongue-in-cheek interview with the cast as a sendup of those TV specials that often precede the airing of any highly anticipated series finale. The interviews that follow are real. Everything said in them is a joke.
Denver Post: So why is former cast member Hannah Duggan not back for the final episode?
Brian Colonna: (awkward pause): Um still in New York?
Denver Post: There is a lot of speculation on the web as to the reason she might miss the finale.
Erin Rollman: She’s pregnant.
Erik Edborg: She has an addiction to biker bars.
Colonna: I’ll be honest, I haven’t heard from her since she left.
Denver Post: So no one has heard from her?
Rollman: I got a mysterious video from her via email. That’s it. No clues.
Colonna: What was on the video?
Rollman: It just said, “This is hysterical. Look at Decky Doo’s feet.”
Evan Weissman: Hannah Duggan and I have not spoken since halfway through season 3.
Rollman: I would actually say – fairly — that the best explanation for why she left might be bad blood.
Denver Post: The rumor online is that there was an affair …
Weissman: I am happily married. I wasn’t married at the time. Speculation is speculation.
Edborg: There really aren’t any rules before you get married.
Rollman: She’s difficult to work with; I’ll give you that. And I don’t want to say anything bad about other people but she’s a terrible actress.
Weissman: She’s bawdy. And I don’t even know what the word means.
Rollman: Yes, she’s a bawdy, terrible actress.
Weissman: She’s a drinker Drugs.
Denver Post: So she is pregnant. She’s a drinker. Does drugs. Probably had an affair with one of you. And yet there is no specific reason she is not here for the finale?
Rollman: No it’s unclear.
Denver Post: No tangible reason for the bad blood?
Rollman: No. We’re professionals.
Denver Post: What about the rumor that the studio has generated all of this gossip to parlay the buzz into some sort of a reunion project down the road?
Rollman: I am not interested in a reunion with these people. I’m going to let a good 15, 20 years go by before I’m coming back.
Edborg: I just signed on for a Wild West stunt show in Tokyo. I signed a contract. I don’t think I can back out on that kind of thing, can I?
Rollman: Probably not.
Edborg: They take their Westerns seriously over there. That’s where karaoke started, you know. It sounds Western but it’s a Japanese word. Wait, Japanese? Or maybe Vietnamese.
Rollman: Probably Chinese.
Edborg: OK, it’s Chinese.
Weissman: John, this is a special group of people. I don’t think you can re-capture the kind of magic we all know we have had working with each other. Not in a two-dimensional medium like film. It’s sad, but
Denver Post: And yet, sitting here talking to you all, I don’t really feel the love.
Edborg: The what?
Denver Post: The love. I’m not feeling – the love.
Rollman: Oh, yeah, you do.
Denver Post: No, I really don’t.
Rollman: Yes, you feel the love!
Denver Post: You all are sitting as far away from each other as is humanly possible while remaining in the same room.
Weissman: Erin and I, we went out to lunch the other day . Well, not lunch, but a bar-be-cue.
Rollman: We ran into each other.
Weissman: Well, we were both on our way to separate bar-be-cues, but we ran into each other. I was getting salmon at the Wild Oats, and she was getting some buns.
Denver Post: So you acknowledged one another?
Edborg: Hey, I just drove past Brian riding on his bike.
Denver Post: On the street?
Edborg: Yeah I didn’t hit him. I I missed him.
Denver Post: So after five years of “Magnets on the Fridge,” what do you think you have accomplished artistically?
Rollman: World domination artistically speaking, I mean. Obviously not like militarily, world domination. I don’t mean that.
Colonna: We skipped Denver.
Rollman: Yeah, not so much Denver.
Edborg: We’re huge in other countries.
Denver Post: So what’s one great story from behind the curtain that your longtime fans will want to know? What are some of the backstage shenanigans we in the audience have not been privy to?
Rollman: Well, it’s not shenanigans, but this is probably something you don’t know Brian’s legs are fake. (knocks on leg) Hear that?
Denver Post: I did not know that.
Weissman: You know how actors sometimes have a little preshow routine?
Denver Post: Yeah.
Weissman: Right before our shows, why, we’ll hide Brian’s legs.
Rollman: We do. We steal his legs (laughing)
Weissman: We give him his legs back just a few seconds before we go out on stage, and as we’re all going on, we stop and give a little knock on his leg. Have you seen the movie “Rudy?” It’s kind of like when the football players are all coming out of the tunnel.
Rollman: Brian has never thought it hysterical, but we’ve always thought it was great. When he goes, “Guys, seriously, where’s my legs?” C’mon, that’s funny.
Weissman: It’s like clockwork. I mean for five years, November through May, every Tuesday and Wednesday.
Edborg: And he can only search within a 5-feet radius of himself, because, you know, he can’t walk. Because we have his legs.
Rollman: And you don’t have to be tall to hold them away from him, either, because he’s so short. You should see him, swiping for them.
Denver Post: Brian, you would think that after maybe a season or two of this, you might start to see it coming.
Colonna: Yeah, you would think so, but I never do. You guys are crafty.
Rollman: It’s more difficult than you’d think, getting legs off a body, without the body noticing.
Denver Post: Is it going to be harder for you to say goodbye to your fellow actors or to your characters?
All: Characters.
Edborg: And I don’t even like my character.
Denver Post: What does that say about how you feel about your fellow actors?
Edborg: Well, a lot. Don’t you think?
Denver Post: Let’s go around the circle and talk about what it’s going to be like for each of you to say goodbye to your characters. Evan?
Weissman: OK, on the show, I have played a late 20s, early 30s white man, OK?
Edborg (whispering): He’s white? I thought he was Canadian.
Weissman: So already, it’s a challenge. And losing Nathan now is like taking away a part of myself, you know, because I have gotten so into that character. Now, I do the Daniel Day Lewis type of acting. I don’t know what it’s called something method or something. Well, I do that type of thing. Meaning I have (Erik) carry me around. Right? Because that’s what Daniel does.
Rollman: When he was in “My Left Foot,” more specifically.
Weissman: OK, I didn’t actually read the Daniel Day Lewis book, so I don’t know why, but I know he had people carry him around.
Rollman: “On Method Acting,” – by Daniel Day Lewis. Hahaha.
Colonna: And often, I will take my legs off and be carried with Evan.
Weissman: Yeah, a lot of times with Brian and I, it looks sort of like a Jewish wedding, where we’re sort of being hoisted, you know, like during the Hora? But yeah, the main thing for me is that losing Nathan is, in a way, like losing a part of myself.
Denver Post: Erin, what’s it going to be like for you to lose Paula?
Rollman: I’d say it’s a shame for the community, losing Paula. Mostly the male community, but the community in general.
Denver Post: Now Paula was, suffice it to say, known for being loose. Is it true what they say around town that Paula’s antics didn’t always come to an end with, say, the end of your performance in a “Magnets” episode?
Rollman: Oh, no. I would just say that an episode of “Magnets on the Fridge is going to run you somewhere between 35 minutes and oh, let’s say five and a half hours.
Denver Post: Now, that’s some method acting, Erin. So Brian, a world without Ernie? What is that?
Colonna: A dark, bleak world. It’s hard to say goodbye. I have had a lot of fun. What won’t be hard to say goodbye to is carrying a live sitcom for five seasons on your shoulders. And I say that with much love and respect to you guys. But I think we can all feel the vibe out there, and Well, I get tired.
Rollman: I bet.
Colonna: I don’t tell you guys that, but I do get tired.
Rollman: Yes, dropping your lines can be very exhausting.
Denver Post: Now Erik, there has been considerable speculation about Paul and
Colonna: What his deal is.
Denver Post: What his deal is. A lot of those questions have been fairly emphatically answered with his now having a girlfriend. But have we reached a satisfying conclusion with him?
Edborg: I don’t think anything about Paul is very satisfying. Except for when he gets to wear hats. But I have kind of a large head so even then, they don’t always fit. I think in Paul I will miss very little. But in “Magnets” I will miss … even less. I will miss carrying the two of them around for his method acting thing, and for his lack of legs. I was just happy for the exercise.
Denver Post: In these reunion shows, fans always love to know where you see these characters five years from now. Evan?
Weissman: I don’t want to give anything away, but as of now, Nathan is in prison, so for now, I am just going to talk about his inner being, which prison walls can’t hold back. What I would like to see with Nathan is letter-writing campaigns, which he can do if he’s in or out of prison. Whether that would be in the vein of stopping corporate abuse or something else, I don’t know maybe a pen pal.
Denver Post: Don’t take this the wrong way, but in performance, Nathan hasn’t always come across as all that motivated.
Rollman: To get a pen pal?
Denver Post: Or to starting a letter-writing campaign.
Rollman: Yep, that’s true.
Denver Post: Can you say that within five years, Nathan will have written a letter?
Weissman: I think you can safely put that down.
Rollman: I will go out on a limb and say that in five years, Paula will not have written a letter.
Denver Post: But as far as a physical place and time, where do you see Paula?
Rollman: It’s just my guess that if the show had gone on for another five years, the writers probably would have gone through a weird, rough period in there somewhere and probably killed her off. It was a mistake on their part, but they did it. I think.
Denver Post: Is it safe to say that she probably will not be joining another book club?
Rollman: That is definitely safe to say.
Weissman: Unless it was hosted at maybe Kitty’s. or Chippendales. One of those kind of clubs.
Edborg: Are those health clubs?
Denver Post: Brian.
Colonna: This is going to surprise a lot of people, but I think in five years, Ernie will be working for a police department as a detective.
Rollman: Doesn’t surprise me.
Colonna: A lot is coming together for him as a detective now.
Rollman: That’s a spin-off show in itself right there.
Colonna: If left unhampered, Ernie is hirable within five years. Starting now, and not being messed with, he could end up as a successful, pensioned public servant.
Denver Post: Turning to Erik, I don’t think it is a coincidence that your show is ending in the same week that “7th Heaven” is signing off the air.
Rollman: You’re right. It’s not a coincidence at all.
Denver Post: All classic long-running shows end with a wedding. “7th Heaven” will. And it seems like there is the opportunity to do that here with Paul and Elizabeth. Erik?
Edborg: The only thing I can say about Paul’s future is that he will probably develop prostate cancer.
Weissman: And considering that 90 percent of men, when they die, have prostate cancer
Edborg: Those are just figures, so about his romantic future, it’s hard to say because sometimes opinions change about a person once you get the prostate checked.
Rollman: I would say to be fair to the show, and to the writers, we can’t really speak to the actual happenings of the last episode.
Edborg: That was more of a personal note. Can I retract that statement? I was just .
Denver Post: Erik, you seem kind of worried.
Edborg: I’ve got anxiety, and I feel like Paul would have the same anxiety. I try to develop my anxieties from within.
Denver Post: Well, who wouldn’t have prostate-cancer anxiety especially at your age?
Weissman: The end of “Magnets” will be the best end of any show ever made in any medium.
Rollman: Yeah. The best.
Weissman: Put quotes around that, newspaperman.
Denver Post: Does no one care where Paul is going to be in five years? Because we never really answered that question.
Edborg: I don’t know if anyone really does care. Selling doughnuts maybe?
Weissman: He’s a solid citizen.
Colonna: There are lots of people who live unheralded lives.
Weissman: I could see him getting a civic award from, say, a neighborhood association.
Colonna: At the very least, I think he will get a perfect attendance award from his job.
Rollman: I imagine him settling down in some respect.
Denver Post: So when the history books are written about “Magnets” – and they will be – what are they going to say was its contribution to art in the world?
Colonna: That the follow-up sitcom we did was even better.
Edborg: Yes: A springboard for greater things.
Weissman: Listen, conventional wisdom states that history is written by the winners, right? We hope “Magnets” gets into history
Denver Post: Uh huh.
Weissman: Do the math.
(general laughing)
Rollman: You didn’t think that whole thing out just there, did you?
Weissman: No.
Rollman: You were kind of dropping off.
Weissman: Oh, here then John, we would prefer if you call it “her-story.”
Rollman: There we go. He thought about that one. Yep!
Denver Post: Now is there anything you want to say about the sitcom you are developing to launch in place of “Magnets” next November? It will follow the same performance pattern, but people are curious to know what the format is going to be.
Rollman: The most fair to thing to say about that is –
Colonna: We’ve all agreed to do the project.
Edborg: It will be much more relaxed than “Magnets.”
Weissman: We’ve all verbally committed to doing it, but we are individually working out contracts, like for getting second or third season of “Friends” money.
Denver Post: And who are you working that out with?
Weissman: You know, the writers and producers.
Denver Post: I thought that was you.
Rollman: I talked about it with Matt Petraglia, and he said he’s going to start paying me $23 an episode.
Denver Post: But Matt Petraglia is your sound designer.
Rollman: I know. Crazy, huh?
Denver Post: My last question is about the final episode. You have based the first 64 episodes on a book title suggested by your audience. But this time, instead of selecting that title at random per usual, you put it up for bid, and reportedly, someone was generous enough to pay you $400 for what?
Rollman: “Oh, The Places You’ll Go!” by Dr. Seuss. The graduation book.
Denver Post: What does a company like yours do with $400?
Rollman: Pizza party. First of all, I didn’t bother to read the book, even though it’s by Dr. Seuss and it’s like two pages long. No. 2, didn’t even use the book in the episode. He paid me $400 for that? Take that.
Colonna: We decided to wrap the money around cigars and conspicuously smoke them.
Denver Post: You bring up an interesting point. When is the last time you had an episode that actually did have something to do with the book suggestion?
Rollman: Don’t know.
Denver Post: I seem to remember an episode of “Sherlock Holmes.”
Rollman: Yeah, way back when. That was like the first season.
Colonna: Where’s that list?
Edborg (whispering): I always thought they were movie titles.
Denver Post: Do you think that’s fair to the audience, or to the guy who paid $400?
Colonna: Yeah, I can just see you in the audience next week, John, standing up and yelling, “This used to be about the books! This used to be about something!”
Denver Post: You know what, Brian? At one time it was. This interview is over.
