We’ll cut to the chase: we are announcing a special episode of our podcast, where we get to speak with Steve Roberts, Brian Frankish and Michael Cassutt, three of the creators behind a little show that is near and dear to the hosts of this podcast.

“Writing And Producing The Future: A Conversation With Steve Roberts, Brian Frankish & Michael Cassutt.”

There is so much talent crammed into this panel of Hollywood Luminaries that it is a shame, really, that we only get them for an hour, and even worse, that they are only discussing the program that they all have in common: something that lived, and still does, at some point 20 Minutes Into The Future…

“Max Headroom” was a short-lived science fiction program with a dark sense of humor and a wicked take on what the future might be like. And, in a very strange turn of events, much of this future happened to become the world we now live in. This ironic twist has not only led to making the dark comedy of this program even darker, but has led to a new podcast, “20 Minutes Into The Future,” where Heather & Austin (two radio nerds) review and discuss these ironies. Now, they get to aim this conversation directly at the creators of the program. 

Writer, Director and Producer Steve Roberts, best known for writing “Max Headroom,” and “Hercules,” as well as developing the Canadian program, “Redwall,” is a charming English gentleman with a wonderful laugh and a very sardonic view of the horrors that technology can offer.  

Novelist, writer and producer Michael Cassutt produced shows like “Z-Nation,” “Strange Luck,” “Eerie, Indiana” and “The Twilight Zone,” as well a having written dozens of scripts for a number of shows. He also worked closely with Steve Roberts on “Max Headroom,” and is a bit of a NASA nerd in his spare time.  

Producer and Director Brian Frankish, who worked on films like “Strange Brew,” “The Last Starfighter,” “The Fugitive,” and “The Crazies,” and relevant to this particular conversation, was the producer on “Max Headroom,” that helped bring Steve & Michael’s stories to the small screen. 

In this panel conversation facilitated via digital communication tools, three of the people who envisioned the future that we all now live in will reminisce, and discuss what it was like to develop this vision. Join us for an hour-long discussion about what it was like to work in the television trenches of the late ’80’s, and listen in to stories about bucking the system and working within it.

“Max Headroom,” was anti-television, anti-corporate power, anti-advertising, and anti-globalism, and yet, was produced by some insightful and adept members of the Hollywood community, who were not afraid to thumb their noses at the establishment. Now, this is our chance to introduce this brand of nose-thumbing to a new generation.

“Writing And Producing The Future: A Conversation With Steve Roberts, Brian Frankish & Michael Cassutt.”

Only on: 20minutesintothefuture.org

Call in with your Memories of Max, and listen to our DEBUT EPISODE, which drops at 4 PM PST, 7 PM EST, or 23:00 GMT.

Let’s go… 20 Minutes Into The Future!

Our Premier Episode will be airing at 23:00 PM, GMT, on 21 March 2021.

7 PM, EST, or 4 PM, PST.

You can hear a sample of our pilot now if you subscribe to the show:

iTunes RSS or Generic RSS. We are also on Mixcloud.

Subscribe today, and live… 20 Minutes Into The Future!

* * * * * *

36 years ago, Channel 4 in the UK took a chance on a very unusual 60 minute “telefilm,” that was to offer the backstory for their new “digital presenter,” who would be showing 13 weeks of music video programing later that Spring and Summer.

What began as an experiment in testing out “cyberpunk” on broadcast television, became “Max Headroom,” who ran rampant through our culture as he moved from mainframe to mainframe, infecting us with the same kind of digital buoyancy that we were all looking for in the late 80’s. First, Max took over in the UK, then moved on to Cinemax and then, finally, improbably, on ABC television, and from there, he went global. After three years of massive exposure in nearly every medium, and becoming one of the world’s most preeminent cola salesmen, Max suddenly vanished… and little has been seen of him since.

Almost 40 years later, it really does seem like Max’s files may have finally gone to the Purge Directory on our cultural network mainframe.

“20 Minutes Into the Future” is a podcast hosted by Heather & Austin, who plan to track and chart the history of this incredible character, and review some of the media that inspired it. The Pilot episode will air March 21st, and the second episode – where they discuss the BBC telefilm, will air exactly 36 Years after the original program aired. A fitting beginning for a show that wants to look at all the details, and figure out what they mean.

Heather is a radio veteran, who currently hosts The Sound of Tomorrow with her co-host, Ross Johnson. Heather is in the demographic for it, and yet, has never seen a lick of Max Headroom. All of this will be new, as she is introduced to this material for the first time.

Austin is a radio nerd and musician, and a big “Max Headroom” fan. Austin discovered the show in the Spring / Summer of 1987, and watched it relentlessly until the show disappeared from the airwaves in 1988. This experience has left him wanting more, and he has revisited this show several times since then. This time, Austin will be taking a more academic look at the series, using Heather’s first-time perspective to help dig deeper into the material’s social dynamics as they are presented.

Join them, every two weeks, as they discover the world of Max Headroom, and find that living 20 Minutes Into The Future is actually eerily like living today.

A Sample of Our Pilot

Here is a short sample of our pilot episode, to give people an idea of what the show will sound like. The show doesn’t launch for a little while yet, but you can hear this, and get a feel for what the show will be like.

Enjoy!

Welcome To 20 Minutes Into The Future!

Here’s a quick promo, to give you an idea of what you can expect from the program.

For the next couple of days, our server will be down. It is being moved to a new location in Portland. Hopefully we won’t be offline for long, and you’ll be the first to know when we’re back up. If there’s any back-episode you’d like to hear until we’re up and running again, please leave a comment.

In the meantime, here’s our show from last night.

Enjoy:

dropbox.com/s/napm1ir4cvp9d7q/Mutation46.mp3

Update: 

As of 13 April, we are back online.  Thank you for your patience.

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