HollywoodOn: Janet Donovan & Brendan Kownacki
Photo credit: Brendan Kownacki
“Our aim is to redefine fact-based storytelling,” said Tim Pastore, President of Original Programming & Production for National Geographic Channel at the screening of their upcoming miniseries, MARS. The innovative series tackles storytelling in whole new way by combining a fictional story of the first manned mission to Mars with documentary style interviews to explain the science of reasoning of what is happening in the story. The story is set in 2033 and is based on the book “How We’ll Live on Mars” by Stephen Patranek; examining the scientific, logistical and cultural challenges of a mission to the red planet. The interviews offer a throwback to present year and speak to the best and brightest minds who are tackling a Mars mission, like Elon Musk, author Andy Weir and former Apollo astronaut Jim Lovell.
Tim Pastore
The mix of drama and documentary blurs fiction and reality to create a unique product unlike any that has been made before. The premise driving the whole project, both in real life and in the series is that Mars is the next frontier for mankind, both to quench our curiosity and to ensure our survival as a species.
But who would really want to go Mars? Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second smallest planet in the Solar System, after Mercury. Visually, it’s a big red ball in the sky. Ben Cotton, who plays Mission Commander Ben Sawyer, told Hollywood on the Potomac he would probably have second thoughts. “It depends on how you look at it, I suppose. If you look at it from the perspective of history, if we become an interplanetary species we ensure the future of humanity then that might be inspiration enough to go, ‘Okay, I’m doing something bigger than myself.’ But yeah, I might rather be in a bar. Last I heard, they aren’t filming anything in Mars and I like acting.”
Justin Wilkes
“Mars is in the zeitgeist. Everyone is kind of thinking of it,” added Justin Wilkes, Executive Producer of MARS. Wilkes described how the general fascination with going to Mars made it a natural subject to explore for series, and after discussions with the team at SpaceX, the vision started to take shape of a project that would document the science and engineering of our space program and then invest the audience in the first Martian mission. “We wouldn’t be here tonight without NASA because you taught us how to dream.”
Everardo Gout Photo credit: Janet Donovan
Director Everardo Gout said that when the chance to bring the project to National Geographic came together, it was a natural fit to exploit the “brain trust” of connections to get the most accurate and in-depth analysis on what it will take to make reality meet the goal of the fictional 2033 mission. “This is not science fiction. This is science fact. There are thousands of people working right now for a mars mission,” he said.
We asked Gout a similar question about going to Mars. “What would you rather be doing, dancing Flamenco in Spain or going to Mars?” “Mars,” he said without hesitation. “My family was very into the arts in Mexico. On my father’s side of the world, he was friends with all of these crazy, beautiful explorers; people like a family friend who’s a fantastic painter and just grabbed a steam boat and crossed the Amazon River on his own. So I always was inspired by those stories of exploration, and of man versus nature.”
“On the other side, my mother was an astrologer,” he told us. “And though she does not believe in religion, she says, ‘Astrology is the poetic side of astronomy.’ As you know, Galileo was both an astrologer and an astronomer. The biggest library in astrology in the world is at the Vatican and it’s the Vatican who made a big step in differentiating the two sciences. Although they don’t believe in astrology, they do have the biggest library. But that’s what I mean; because all the astronomers before were also astrologers and they were interested in the influence of the heavenly bodies including ourselves. But, it was too close to God, so they said, ‘Let’s draw a line’ and this part is science, this is garbage and they made a big split of it.”
“So, to make a long story short,” Gout explained, “she did give me that strive to look at the stars and to know that somewhere deep down, we are connected with the stars. And the Earth is pulled by the gravity of the sun so why wouldn’t we, as human beings, be also pulled by the gravity of the sun? So this story that would be exploration into the unknown plus into the stars I think was a perfect opportunity for me. And, on top of that, the fact that it was for National Geographic was an extra cherry on the top for me. And, when they explained to me they want to re-brand, they want to bring a lot of the quality to the programming, to the camera, I thought, ‘Wow! What a great way to keep track of something that gave me so much.’ And to make a show that is shown all over the world where you usually turn on the TV and hear about madness and chaos and stuff … assassinations, corruption and terrorist attacks…… to make a show that actually inspires the younger generations into wonder, into invention, into creativity, it was something that I couldn’t miss. So yes, I would go to Mars. I mean … I think I would … I have a daughter and she’s 11 now. She’s part of the drive for us to build this project, and she was the one that told me, ‘You have to do the Mars thing.’ If I could go with her and we could come back, yes. But not on the first mission, but once if it gets established as a safe and you could go for a couple of months and come back, I would do it. As for the astronauts, they are the super humans because they have to be physically fit, they have to be super smart, they have to have PhD and a sense of humor and they have to be a little bit crazy.”
Jihae – “Hana and June Seung” in MARS Photo credit: Janet Donovan
This was the first acting role for musician Jihae. So how did she do it? “When you’re under the gun and you have missionary creatives gleaming in you, you have to take the courage and push through and give your best and trust that that’s going to be okay. Apparently they were looking for someone for four months and they couldn’t find the right actor. Then, at that point, Eduardo the director, who’s an old friend of mine, was going through casting tapes and he saw someone that reminded him of me and then he thought, ‘Oh my gosh, what an idiot. All this time. I didn’t think of her.’ Then he brought me in to do the audition process and they went with it.”
Dr. Jim Green
One such expert already tackling the mission to Mars is NASA’s Dr. Jim Green, Planetary Science Division Director. Green was quick to point out that Mars is not a distant future out of reach because “we’re on Mars today,” referring to multiple rovers that have already landed on the Martian surface. “Each and every day we learn about mars to make this easier.”
The innovation and the development that it will take to get to Mars will also benefit life on Earth the way the space program has brought us inventions like velcro. The path forward is unclear but it takes shape every day. The National Geographic series suffers in some ways from being too academic and showing that space travel isn’t all shiny and sexy and adventurous, at times the series highlights the tedium of calculations the waiting that occurs during months of travel and hours of delays before data is transmitted. The story highlights that it is patience and dedication that will take us to Mars, and that attitude, on Mars or not will be the savior of our species.
The first in the series start tonight.
