HARMONY GOLD INTERVIEW
Typed by Tom Mitchell
Downloaded by Sunny Hirai
Reformatted by William Chow
THE FOLLOWING INTERVIEW WITH RICHARD FIRTH, HARMONY GOLD'S DIRECTOR OF
CREATIVE SERVICES, APPEARED IN THE VOLUME 2, NUMBER 3 MAY 1986 ISSUE OF MACROSS
LIFE (THE OFFICIAL NEWSLETTER OF THE MACROSS FAN CLUB). FOR MORE INFORMATION
ABOUT THE MACROSS FAN CLUB, WRITE: THE MACROSS FAN CLUB P.O. BOX 2566 COSTA
MESA, CA 92628-2566 JUST JOINED THIS EXELENT CLUB, AND I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT.
THE NEWSLETTER, MACROSS LIFE, IS GREAT - TOM MITCHELL
FEATURE INTERVIEW: RICHARD FIRTH...HARMONY GOLD'S MAN OF PUBLICITY
Ko the Creation Con on the weekend of March 22, 23 at the Disneyland Hotel,
your club director, Yvette Nunn, had the pleasure of interviewing Richard Firth
of Harmony Gold. He was present for the ROBOTECH SALUTE, which kept him quite
busy. Luckily, Yvette was able to get him at a free moment on the second,
less busy day of the con. Without further Introduction...
MACROSS LIFE: Before we get started, I'd like to thank you for being able to
give us this interview. Now, please tell us just what your job at Harmony Gold
is.
RICHARD FIRTH: I am the Director of Creative Services which involves publicity,
promotional work, and advertising for the company, particularly for ROBOTECH
and HARLOCK, etc.
ML: How did you get into this job?
RF: Well, I had worked with other TV companies. With Group W, I worked on HOUR
MAGAZINE then HE-MAN. From there I went into celebrity publicity for people
like Lisa Welchel, and Michael J. Fox when they were not quite as known. Then
I went over to Telepictures where I worked on THE LOVE CONNECTION and their
soap opera, RITUALS. I also did work on the launch of THUNDERCATS. I then heard
the HARMONY GOLD was in need of a director of Creative Services, which was one
notch above my previous jobs. I was ready, there was really no way I could
further progress at Telepictures, so I took it. I received a "Robo-education"
in three days flat. Immediately after that, I was at San Diago Comic Con doing
the very best I could. People were asking me things like,
"What's protoculture," and I had to look up what I did not know in a ROBOTECH
bible. It was a battle by emersion, actually!
ML: Is the success of the series a surprise?
RF: No, oh no. It has always been my theory that if you treat audiences
intelligently they will stick with you and that's what has happened. The people
are looking at it and saying, "This is more than just an animated series."
It is more reality based.
ML: Let's talk about the characterization. It's deeper thanjust about all of
the American animated series. When you sawthese qualities of deep
characterization, what was your reaction?
RF: Well, you have to understand that I had just come off working on a soap
opera for an entire year!
ML: So you were just jumping from one right to another...
RF: Exactly! There's the complex relationships between the characters, the
treatment of controversial themes: I mean what other animated strip has the
consumption of alcohol. Obviously, you have a love triangle, you have a cross
dressing character, and inter-racial romance for Roy and Claudia, so it was
very much the same. Here were all the same character and situation of
RITUALS...That's the way we've been handling it. We've been treating it, the
story line, like the complex relationships you have in a soap opera.
ML: I really think that Robotech is a transition point for "American" animated
shows now...
RF: Exactly. And then You've got the Sentinals for next year. You'll see the
children growing up: you'll see Dana Sterling and Bowie Grant as kids. And later
in the series, Scott Bernard as a child. So you'll geta feel, I mean it's
obviously compressed from a soap opera genre, but you get to see what makes
these characters the way they are. It would finally make some sense why Dana
Sterling would risk her entire group to go back and save Bowie Grant because
it's more than just being a leader, commander, it's a long relationship like
in the terms of being brother and sister. So it will make more sense.
ML: Can you tell me more about the UNTOLD STORY, like who's doing Eve's voice?
RF: Well, we want to get away from that title. It's actuallynow known as
ROBOTECH: THE MOVIE. And as for whom is doing Eve's voice, you'll have to ask
Carl about that. It's his job, not mine, but I can tell you what it's about...
ML: Great!
RF: OK, It's takes place during the time period where the SDF-1 is making it's
ways back from the edge of our solar system from having been folded there by
Admiral Gloval. We cut back and forth from what's happening on Earth. basically,
is thatthe secrets of Robotechnology, the very existence of Robotechnology, are
being held from the public. They (thegovernment) don't want the public to know
about it. You see, they would have to admit that all this did not come from
Earth but someplace else, and they don't want to do that because it would
terrify the population. On the other hand, the "true believers," as they are
called, peoplewho think that they know how everybody else should be, B.D.
Edwards and his crew, feel that they should be in control of this and that
it's the best interest to save the Earth. But unfortunately, the folks, the
Earthlings, the three girls and guy, as it were, are interested in bringing
notice: they have the bike that they have gotten, as it were. The male
character's friend has been killed for showing him the bike. He now has it,
and he must find a way of making everybody know it exists.
ML: Eve - is she still a computer generated person like in MEGAZONE 23.
RF: We are trying not to make a big deal out of it. We are trying to let the
surprise work. I mean the people that already know from MZ23, that's fine,
but for those seeing it for the first time, well...As well, there will be
new music and it is due out this summer.
ML: What are your personal expectations, Richard?
RF: Well, I'd like to keep working for a few years! The Expectations are that
we'll do the SENTINALS, and then we are hopeful for another 65 for ROBOTECH 3.
Carl's got plans through ROBOTECH 5 which would give us an episode for each day
of the year for a year and a half. He would like to makeit circular so that the
last episodes we'll say, "Episodes 285." They'd lead back into the first ever
episode. It wouldmake sense. The retired Commodore Hunter, whom ever that
maybe, could very well be speaking at the graduation of the later day cadets
or whatever, and they ask him to tell them the story all over again: it comes
back.
ML: So what led Carl Macek to choose Macross over the multitude of others
(aside from Southern Cross and Mospeada)?
RF: Well, it had to do with what Harmony Gold owned. Carl is fond of telling
people that we at HG went to his store and bought some animation cells from
some other productions we do...they asked him if he thought this would work,
because they saw all the Japanese publications and things and he made some
phone calls and sold the comic rights and everything that afternoon. They
brought him in, he looked at their library of tapes andsaw Macross which he was
already aware of, along with Southern Cross and Mospeada. So he was able to
put the series together.
ML: I understand that the price tag for the MACROSS MOVIE:DO YOU STILL REMEMBER
LOVE was too high and that the movie itself would not fit into the length of
what you wanted to do.
RF: It also did not have much to do with what we were doing anymore. They
[Tatsunoko] had changed it appreciably like the second MZ23 movie. Also, since
the price tags are so high in Japan, it's easier if it costs the same amount
to animate it the way we want it. Why spend all that money on something that
would cost even more to fix?
ML: Do you have any personal favorites from Japan's series/shows?
RF: Yes. I have, though I don't understand because of the language, enjoyed
CRUSHER JOE and the spoof with the two girls, THE DIRTY PAIR. But unfortunately,
we don't own them. The DUNBINE episodes are beautiful. The thing is, we need
65 episodes to syndicate a series. The MACROSS MOVIE, for that reason, was not
one of our choices. It just did not suit our purpose. And using shows that
look really different are hard to fit in. Of course, there's always the chance
to do the "the best of Japanese Animation," put together 5 or 10 episodes of
each one so that people can enjoy it. But that is in the future.
ML: How is the success of the Robotech Fan Club, the "RDF" (ROBOTECH DEFENCE
FORCE)?
RF: It's doing well. Now that we've gotten the elements out, the membership
kits, it's starting to pick up. We have a quarterly newsletter, graphics,
items available, things like that.
ML: What would you like to say to our members?
RF: Just that I thank them very much for showing so much interest in
something in the fantasy created through Macross. It's important to us that
we are able to stimulate people's imagination. ...this is what we enjoy.
It's a thoughtful pensive strip as opposed to something that sort of ends
each day. It's very important to us that they are so interested in what we
are doing and we thank them very much.
END