#284: Asparagus Live at The Goldfish Bowl

I got in early this morning to prep for the quarterly social media metrics review this week. The sponsors are coming in on Thursday and the Committee needs the numbers. Which are trending nicely, so I’m not sweating it, but you never know what Slothrop’s going to say. He gets touchy whenever the sponsors visit. Speaking of, there’s been some movement on the Licensing side with the Gus the Cat franchise. The ex-Studio Ghibli people funded an animated pilot, which they’ll run online in Japan during the Grand Sumo tournament in Sept while Artie’s there as a guest of Konishiki. Which sounds great, but it’s like deja vu with the “Miss Fourth of July” deal & the Bollywood people. The Ex-Ghibli guys want to do away with Gus’s backstory, the Cats the Musical part anyway, and make him the lead singer in a J-Pop boy band called Katsu!, which according to Wiktionary is “a word shouted out in Zen Buddhism and East Asian martial arts schools, used to help focus the energy (気 (ki)), and thereby induce an enlightened state.” Apparently the boy band thing is a cover for his real job, which is part of a secret intelligence unit attempting to infiltrate the Yakuza. Instead of being a shallow dissembler, Katsu! will be an articulate spokesperson for Shinto and instead of guitar he’ll play a traditional three-stringed shamisen, which doubles as some sort of weapon when he plays the right chord combo. They have an idea for a Kabuki version, if it takes off. Artie stuck to his creative guns on the Bollywood negotiation, but that was bc of the gender change that pushed Syd out of the role. Not sure what he’s going to do here. Slothrop was to do it, but Artie’s contract gives him veto power over creative differences on film deals. I think Slothrop’s been angling with Legal for a work around. I guess we’ll find out this week when everyone’s back. -Ed.