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Awesome Opportunities by Lauren Slusser

On the set of "Life After Film School," I've gotten to meet some amazing industry professionals, but the show has lead to some awesome opportunities off set as well.  Marie, Gabe, and I recently interviewed Mike Henry, creator and star of The Cleveland Show, and after the taping wrapped, he invited the three of us to a table read at his studio!  I'm a huge fan of Mike and The Cleveland Show (I've seen every episode), so I jumped at the chance.

Marie describes what the table read was like in her most recent blog post - basically, all of the actors sit around a table and read through the script out loud, in character, while executive producer Richard Appel reads the stage directions.  Meanwhile, an audience of friends and coworkers provides the laugh track.  Mike listens for which lines play well, and which don't work, so they can change the script in time for the record session.  It was a fantastic read - I was cracking up the entire time.

Afterwards, we were treated to a tour of the studio, where The Cleveland Show, Family Guy, and American Dad are created.  We got to see Mike's cool office, which was full of baseball paraphernalia, Cleveland souvenirs, and even a framed piece of poop.  Mike was inspired to enter the film industry by director David Lynch, who is also one of my favorites, and has a giant signed poster of Wild At Heart on his wall.  Mike was so generous and kind to the three of us during our visit - we walked away with autographs and free t-shirts!

We also got to see behind the scenes of the animation process on Cleveland.  We saw how the script is drawn out into storyboards, which are edited into moving animatics, then timed using exposure sheets before they're sent to Korea to be animated.  I was surprised to see that their animation process is just like the one I'd gotten to see as an intern with Nickelodeon's Dora the Explorer.  It drove home for me just how time and labor-intensive making animated TV is - it's definitely a labor of love.

We had an amazing time on the set of The Cleveland Show, and now I can't wait for its next season to start!