I am once again back in Austin, TX for my annual TV camp experience, for Season 13 of the ATX TV Festival. I have been coming to this festival since season 4! My day started really early, getting up at 3am to head to the airport, but the trip was smooth, and after arriving, I headed over to the Driskill to check in to the festival and pick up my badge. This year, the annual tote bag is sponsored by FOX’s hilarious show Animal Control.
With badge in hand, I headed over to 800 Congress for the “Animal Control” panel, which featured stars Vella Lovell (“Emily Price”) & Grace Palmer (“Victoria Sands”). These two ladies were hilarious together! Palmer talked about her fear of birds, but also how it was great to experience new animals on the show she had never seen before. She said that she learned that she doesn’t like reptiles, and yet agreed to film with a snake for the upcoming season 3. She also talked about how she originally auditioned with both an American and her NZ accent, and only found out after she got the part, which one she was going to be using. Lovell proudly talked about being a cat lady and how she loves working with the animals. The two also talked a bit about their characters’ will-they-or-won’t-they relationships and how they appreciate the longer roll out of tis. Both women shared stories about their use of improv on set and how amazing it was to work with guest star Ken Jeong. They also discussed how some of the storylines were close to their own lives, such as Victoria discovering last minute about her citizenship test after Lovell forgot to give her the letter. They also talked about working with the various members of ensemble guest. This fun panel was a great way to start off the festival!
This year Pluto TV has sponsored a badgeholder lounge, which is offering free breakfast, lunch and happy hour every day! So I stopped by to check this out and grab some food. In addition to the food, they also have a photo opp station, and folks giving out some branded swag, such as a much needed battery-powered fan, for downloading the Pluto TV app. I will definitely be stopping by here many times throughout the weekend!
Next, I headed over to the Driskill hotel’s Crystal Room for the “An Actor, a Casting Director, and a Casting Executive Walk In to an Audition…” panel. Due to some scheduling, there was no Casting Executive, but despite the now incorrect title, it was still a really fun and interesting conversation with casting director Felicia Fasano (Survival of the Thickest, Better Things) and actress Torrey DeVitto (Chicago Med). They discussed the audition process and how it has changed since the pandemic, where self-tapes have now become the norm. While they noted a couple benefits, both sides generally missed being in the room for auditions. They also shared good and bad stories about both sides of the casting process. And in an answer to an audience question, DeVitto talked about booking 2 lines on a Dawson’s Creek episode and thinking she made itmdash;especially since her mother had forbid her to watch the show after Joey mentioned a sex act on an episode. This is one thing that’s really nice about this festival is that you get these kinds of industry themed panels that aren’t just centered on a single show.
After the panel, I headed over to Stephen F. Austin Royal Sonesta hotel for the Opening Night Red Carpet (and may have popped in again next door at the Pluto TV Badgeholder lounge to grab some food). Panelists and guests from many of the weekend’s panels were present. I got the chance to speak with Somebody Feed Phil star Phil Rosenthal, who had his children Ben and Lily and brother Richard with him—who will be doing a panel together this weekend. I also spoke with Animal Control stars Vella Lovell & Grace Palmer, the co-creators of HBO’s Industry, Mickey Down & Konrad Kay, actor Brian Tee (Expats, Chicago Med), Fantasmas star/creator Julio Torres, and ATX TV Festival Co-Founders Caitlin McFarland & Emily Gipson. I’ll be posting these videos ASAP, so be on the lookout.
After the red carpet was over, I headed over to the Paramount Theater for the premiere of the new HBO series Fantasmas, which airs Friday June 7 on HBO/Max. I think if you have enjoyed Julio Torres’ other programs like Los Espookys and Problemista, you’ll enjoy this one. Like most of his work, it’s a bit hard to explain, but this is more of an anthology comedy series with various sketches weaved into a larger narrative. The audience was roaring with laughter throughout.
I didn’t stay for the Q&A because it overlapped with the TV Trivia Night event.
Last year was the first time I participated in the annual TV Trivia Night event, and I had so much fun that I wanted to make sure I did it again (winning a prize last year also helped). I reunited with most of my team, though we were missing one of our MVPs from last year. This year we called our team “We Can Hacks It”. The four rounds centered around the topics of Suits, Hacks, The Way Home, and Vampires. In all cases, if there was a show name in the category title, only one question was actually about that show, while the rest were about the general concept. For example, Suits also has questions about Don Draper, and Barney from How I Met Your Mother. We did quite well in the first few rounds, only missing 1 or 2 questions and we were tied for third place going into the final round. However, the Vampire category was extremely tough, going for a different format of a character name and a quote, and you had to name the show. We missed 3 this round, and ended up with a total of 33/40, tying for fourth place, and just getting shut out for a prize. But it was still a fun time. There were also tacos, chips, wine and Coke products provided at the event.
Afterwards, I headed back to my hotel to get some sleep after a non-stop day.
There was a lot of other great programming offered that unfortunately overlapped in my schedule, so I didn’t get to check them out. The Stateside Theater hosted two big events—”Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire: Season 2 Screening and Q&A” with creator/executive producer Rolin Jones, executive producer Mark Johnson, and star Assad Zaman (“Armand”), plus a “Hacks: Season 3 Finale Screening and Q&A with actor Mark Indelicato (“Damien”).
The good thing is that most of the panels will eventually make their way to the ATX YouTube channel/Podcast, so if you missed something you will be able to catch it there.
You can find our other daily recaps of Season 13 here: Day 2, Day 3, Day 4.
