On today's Show, Sebastion Talks to the world's leading expert on Tarzan, Scott Tracy Griffin. Tracy has written books on Tarzan and served as a consultant for many projects about the subject.

In this episode, Tracy dives into what makes the IP of Tarzan special, his history with the subject, and what he'd want to see in a new Tarzan adaptation.

We got all this and more on this episode of Notable Nerds!

Tracy's Links:

Website: http://scotttracygriffin.com/

Link to his Author page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B00NF3F76Q?ingress=0&visitId=233d5cce-920c-4f04-8533-30780153a0d0

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Coming up on today's episode of Notable Nerds, we have

Scott Tracy Griffin with us today.

Tracy is a renowned author and he is the world's most leading

expert in all things Tarn.

In this episode, we're gonna talk about some of the best

aspects of the past about Taza.

We're gonna talk about Tarzan's current state, and Tracy's gonna give

his hope for the future of the ip.

Not to mention he's also gonna give some really good advice to writers who wanna

be the leading expert in a subject.

So stay tuned for all that and more on this episode of Notable Nerd.

This is Notable Nerds, a Pro Nerd Report podcast, where we

introduce you to really cool nerds who are with really cool things.

I'm your host Sebastian Maldi, and my goal is to highlight nerdy, talented

people who are killing it in the world.

In each episode, we will hear their origin story and they will impart a

bit of advice and wisdom to others who might be looking to get in their

industry or just learn something new.

Without further ado, thank you for joining us, and now let's

meet today's notable nerd.

Ladies and gentlemen, like I said in the intro of the episode, we have

a very special guest with us today.

He has done a lot of things, but you'll know him as being an

expert and all things Tarzan.

We'll get into all of his accolades as the show goes on, but he is the

authority on Tarzan and I'm excited to have him on the show today.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is Scott Tracy Griffin.

Scott, how you doing today?

I'm doing great.

Thanks for having me,

man.

Thank you so much for being on the show today.

Scott, before we begin, can you give some facts about yourselves to let

people get to know you a little bit?

Okay.

I grew up in Starkville, Mississippi, which was a small town when I was

growing up here years ago, and was a, an outdoor kid, ran around a lot outside and

played outside and was also a bookworm.

Rains a lot in Mississippi, so that gives us plenty of time to read.

Grew up in Stark and went to Milsaps College, a small private liberal

arts college in Jackson, Mississippi.

Tried on several different majors for sign size.

Wound up with a degree in sociology.

Then I, as soon as I graduated, I headed out to Los Angeles to pursue a

career in entertainment and have done a lot of things in the entertainment

field over the years from, theater and acting and things like that to writing.

I've been writing for about 30 years now professionally.

I started out writing for the movie magazines, like sent Fantastic

and fem fatals and film facts covering the movie beat for them.

My area of interest, as you indicated, is the author Edgar Rice Burs

and his creations like Taron of the Apes and John Carter of Mars.

This has been a passion since childhood.

I discovered ATUs when I was nine years old.

I went into the bookstore and they had a big display of books

with covers by Neil Adams.

And I must have sat stood there for an hour looking at every book and

reading the back cover, and reading the inside cover, trying to decide.

And I decided to start my journey with Tar of the Apes, the very

first book by at Rice Burrows.

And, it didn't take long before, wasn't very far into the novel boy before.

I thought, hey, this guy can really tell a story.

In the South, we come from a very much a storytelling tradition in oral tradition.

Udo Welty, William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, these are all Mississippi

people, not to mention Elvis Presley.

So the South has, and especially Mississippi, has been known

for the arts and story.

Yeah, for sure.

Growing up, you hear all these tales from your grandparents about their

childhood and great-grandparent.

So I was really fascinated with who was this man that told this

story and how did he tell it?

And, I saw the little bile that he had died some years before.

And by the time I was 12, I had gotten this huge biography of

Edgar Bros called EDRO Bros.

The Man who created Tar.

And it's about 900 pages long, it's enormous.

And the author Irwin Porches was given a decade to go into

the files of Edgar Gro burs.

His family gave him, gave PO's full reign to just dive into the files.

And Bros was a bit of a pack rat.

He kept everything, laundry lists, grocery lists, correspondence.

So we really have a really complete idea and view of this man, not only

professionally, but personally, who he was and his creative process.

So when

you were first introducing yourself to his writings and such,

what really stood out to you?

What made you fall in love with his, like the way he writes

the adventure the storytelling, the cliff hanger endings it, he

wrote page turners, you've got to turn that page to see what happened.

And they're very colorful, whether it's the Tarn and people think of Tarn,

they think of Johnny Weis, Mueller, and the Treehouse and the Chimp.

You get into the novels and there was definitely a fantasy element

of science fiction element.

He had all these different lost races and tribes and things he encountered.

Dinosaurs and deepest Africa.

Brother of course wrote the John Carter of Morris series of 11 books.

Those are fascinating and the springboard for everything that came after.

Flash Gordon, star Wars, avatar, all of these properties were inspired

by Edgar Rice burs in his works.

That's the main thing is he just grabs you, I think he's

a page turner, his writing.

So do I know you're an expert in all things Tarzan, but is

there another like IP of his that really stands out to you as well?

Is it John Carter of Mars?

Yeah.

I love John Carter.

I love all of his stuff.

I love his fa scifi fantasy.

I love tar actually like the world of Mars, that's really my favorite world.

The moon stuff.

He wrote a trilogy called The Moon Made that's really evocative and fascinating.

One reason I got steered toward Tarn is there have been so many Tarn movies.

50 two authorized Tarn films.

Tarn just really took off in 1912 when he wrote it.

And so that's sort where I've had two books published.

The Taron Centennial Celebration, which was about Taron in general,

the Taron phenomenon, the hundred year anniversary, and 2012.

And then wrote Taron on film, which was about the 52 authorized

films and seven TV series.

Probably 90 to 95% of everything we see in society that has to do with it.

Gross Bros.

Taron.

But I love his other stuff Equally.

I've probably read everything he's.

Had published at least a dozen times each and all the bios and bibliographies

people keep coming back to Taron because he was just a touchstone myth

that really took off commercially.

But I think Burr's genius was a cross thing.

He wrote westerns, he wrote two excellent novel novels about the Apache Wars

from the perspective the of the Apache which was groundbreaking at the time.

Before, later on, in the 1950s, sixties, seventies, we started having

movies that were westerns that were what they would call revisionist, but

they actually told the story from the perspective of the Native Americans.

So he was writing about this in the 1930s, and yeah, just his whole

body of work I'm in love with.

So is there like a tar and adaptation that really stands out

to you more so than all the others?

That's a good question.

, I think the first half of Gray Stoke Got it.

The part in the jungle.

, because Robert Town, who had been he was nominated for three Oscars

in a row, three Academy Awards for writing, for shampoo in Chinatown.

And he sat down and he tried to put, adapt the novel faithfully to the screen.

And he wrote the jungle section and he was supposed to direct it.

It was going to be his directorial debut.

He lost the movie, lost control of the movie, and it was taken

from him and given to Hugh Hudson.

And Hugh Hudson went in a different direction.

He had done Chariots of Fire and put the Edwardian England

sequence in it with his rider.

So it really veered off in a different direction.

But I think the jungle sequence of Grey Oak is great.

It really doesn't harken back to dress bro.

It has the spirit and of the ity.

And the savagery, the first two Johnny Weiss smaller films, Parson the Eight Man,

and Taron and his mate MGM did those and they were very big budget, very big deal.

MGM put a lot of resources into that.

And then there were two Gordon Scott films, the last two Gordon Scott films

called Carson's Greatest Adventure, and Taron Magnificent, where you had

this sort of savage fial tars and hunting down bands of outlaws in Africa.

And so those are the ones I really recommend to people if they want to see

at least the spirit of boroughs on screen.

Of course readers of IPOs will tell you none of his works

have ever been done justice.

And that's a bit of, there's, that's a source of hot debate

with the John Carter movie.

Some burs fans hate it and feel like he got it all wrong.

Some.

I have mixed feelings and some love it.

I guess I would fall in the mixed feelings.

I, I think Stanton absolutely got some things right.

The FARs, the hatchery, the Green men that was all just like the

novel and it was really great.

But he did, his plot line veered from the novels.

And I think the Disney's taron it's wonderful.

Again, it's not really based on the original novel it has that spirit

and, just for, have someone take the mythos seriously and deliver

quality entertainment, I'm happy anytime someone takes it seriously

and delivers quality entertainment.

I thought the legend of Taron with Scores Garden and Margot Robbie, that was.

Again we saw glimpses of the Tarn from the books, but he's the literary Tarn

is a lot different than the film Taron.

I I think the last like real, like major film adaptation was Legend of

Taron, with Margo, Robbie Em Jackson, yep.

2016.

. Why has there been such a lull in the ip?

Do you thi do you think?

That's a good question.

In from 1918 to 1968, a span of 51 years, there were 40 Tarn movies.

So there was a Tarn movie, every 14, 16 months.

Yeah, for sure.

And then it just hit a dry spell.

And I think there were several factors.

One thing after Cy Wine tr he was the producer, he produced seven movies

in the Ronnie Lee Tarn series and.

The Ron Eely series was, I really like it.

, Ron did a lot of his own stunts.

He put himself in great peril with these animals.

He was wrestling and suffered a lot of injuries.

They finally had to, shut the series down.

Not because of ratings, but because of insurance costs were skyrocketing.

And the producer was afraid Ron was gonna kill himself, fighting all these animals

and doing all these stunts, . But that was there was a retrenchment and a producer

named Stan Cantor obtained the rights and he was friends with Robert Town and

they took their time and unfortunately Gray Stoke went into development.

Hell, it took 14 years to get that movie on screen.

And then they were gonna do Grace Oak too.

That took 14 years.

That was the Casper Vaneen movie.

Taron and the lost City.

Then the.

Legend of TAR was scars guard that took 14 years.

They started, Warner Brothers obtained the rights around 2001,

2002, they did the Travis Fel series.

That was eight episodes.

And that didn't take off.

And so they just kept renewing the rights.

So it's been plagued by development.

Hell, for one thing, I think another, disadvantage is with things like

Disney, Marvel, star Wars, DC , you have these monolithic corporate

entities and they have power, they have clout, they have resources.

The EG gross company is a small family held company, and, they're the ones

in charge of getting tourism onscreen.

And so they've had some misfires.

It's a small company.

They're, they don't have a huge staff.

And I think they're the little guy.

It's a case of David facing Goliath, of the Hollywood industry.

. I think that's the case is the brand, the franchise doesn't have the clout that

some of the bigger brands and franchises have, which is a shame because the content

is there, the content is wonderful and so much of his burs output has never

been, truly visualized on screen.

So there's tremendous potential there.

How do you think people

would react to see a you mentioned earlier that you, that most

like real tar and fanatics don't really feel like there's been a true adaptation.

How do you think people, like the mainstream people would react to

seeing a true adaptation of Tars and on either in theaters are, on a, as a TV

show?

If it was done well, I think it would find an audience, you that's the challenge is

you know, making sure that this producer that's telling you all these great,

wonderful things he can do with your property actually has the chops to do it.

, I believe the company, they've had some low budget projects in the past,

low budget TV and things that I think were conceived with good intentions,

but they just didn't turn out.

So I, I think if you had the budget, you had the talent

the audience would be there.

I think one thing that sort of has been a challenge in the past, I talk

about the golden era from the 19 teens to or the 1930s at least till 1960s,

was the Johnny Weiser Tarson, where just this huge cloud hanging over.

The film Taron is MGM and Johnny Wiseman and Marino Sullivan.

They really made that property their own, and bur just sold the

Taron name and the character.

He forbid MGM from using any elements from the novels, he did not.

He'd had, there'd been eight silent films and burs, every silent film was supposedly

adapted from a novel and everyone failed.

When at least creatively they did tremendous business commercially.

But burs felt like they were creative failures because they

diverged from its novel so much.

So when MGM came along for the first sound Taron film and started negotiating the

rights in 1931, bur said, you can take the character, and hear the guidelines.

There were certain guidelines that Tarn has to be, have this heroic Stature.

He can't be an antihero, he can't do villainous things or evil things, but

he let them do their own thing and they did it well, they created this mytho

of Tarn and Jane in a treehouse with a, an adopted kid named boy and a chimp.

Named Cheetah.

And when TV became big in the fifties those movies started just running

around the clock on the weekends.

So kids, new generations of kids grew up with them as the matte nays

watching them with their family.

So I think, Johnny Wemo is, was for many years the elephant in the room.

And that people, even now when I'm on social media and I post stuff about Ron

Eely, who was a respectable Taron in his own right, I get plenty of people saying,

Johnny Weissman was the only Taron.

There is no taron but Johnny.

So I think that's, you talk about public perception, that's

sort what has to overcome.

And as the Johnny Weissman movies, as time goes on and they're black and

white and I don't think they have the popularity audience that they once did.

They're classic.

Certainly, I think maybe we can see this savage tar and we could see a

tarn in Palous or the land at the earth's core which is a, burs theorized

that the earth was hollow or heat.

Based these books on existing theories, pseudoscience theories of the turn of

the century, that the earth was hollow and that it was full of prehistoric

lands and dinosaurs and so forth.

What Jules Fern did with Journey to the Center of the Earth.

So I think it's possible the way in the entree may be animation because I think

there's a level of suspended reality.

I was just about to suggest that yeah, I, yeah,

I think that's a perfect ad.

That would be perfect for that.

Another, a adaptation of tar, because like animation has come such a long way.

Yes.

I think that might be a potential to adapt the novels and give people a new flavor.

And of course there's still different approach.

That people, when I worked for the company, I worked for Edberg Incorporated

for three years and talked to a variety of studios and studio executives and

producers and how do they come in and bring tar into a new generation.

And Tarn has always been adapted to his times.

He's a reflection of the times.

In the, yeah, I mentioned the two Gordon Scott movies, the 1959 and

1960 Taron, the Magnificent and Tarn Tarzan's Greatest Adventures.

If you watch those, they're basically westerns.

It's the Lone Man against the Band of Outlaws.

And of course Taron is compromised.

They wound him and he's tracking him through the bush.

He's one guy against four.

It's very much taken with the sensibility of a Western.

That's true.

I've never thought of it like that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then Jock Mahoney, he did.

Tarns three challenges and Tarson goes to India.

Those were travel logs, the world was opening up in exotic lands.

People could start to afford to travel to these exotic lands.

And so they took Tarn there.

And then, you had the Mike Henry movies, Tarn and the Valley of Gold and Taron

the Great River where Taron was this James Bond style who Jet jetted in with

his business suit and is outta she case.

And he, then he went to the zoo and broke the lion and the chimp out and

went into trouble for adventures.

There was very definitely a James Bond spy angle to those pictures.

So Taron has always been adapted to the times and you

know what's interesting too is.

Tarn was very much family friendly entertainment and the

tar novels, it's very savage.

He kills without compunction because he grew up, raised by animals

and that's, his killer be killed.

Yeah.

Survival to fit is so to speak.

And I think now we're getting to a point where we can take our

superheroes a little more seriously take the myth and so forth, and that

it doesn't have to be grated anymore.

You can do PG 13 or hard, PG 13 or even r rated in the case of Deadpool.

You, yeah, you're not getting, lose an element of your audience with that.

The PG probably has the broadest possible audience or PG 13, and once

you go r or more serious, more adult.

Lose a certain element of family, audience and that's a certain amount of box office.

But I do think that audiences would be a little more receptive to a more

savage tar when you've got, people like Wolverine, Deadpool, we're

seeing Savage Heroes on screen.

Oh yeah.

Even then

Batman has become a

lot more vicious.

Yes.

. Yes, definitely.

And I think that's like the, that's the closest modern day

comparison that I can think of.

Besides James Bond is Batman now is more like adults.

Not necessarily, he's not necessarily an adult character like Deadpool, but

he is closer to that marker than he was like when he was first created

and when he was first introduced to the public and his TV debut.

And Tarn could be something very similar to that.

Yes.

And going back to the John Carter series.

Very violent.

Mars was a very marshal society and I don't know if you noticed, if when you

saw John Carter, but I think it was deliberate that Andrew Stanton cast

people from the mini-series, Rome.

He casted some of the actors, probably because they were used to that sort

of costume drama and this, the society on Mars is very similar to Rome.

You have not just the wardrobe, but the battles the fights, the war.

It was very Marshall series, very Marshall Plan, a very violent, John Carter

lopping off heads and leading into battle and so Mars is another one that, that

could be taken, very seriously and show violence and the effects of violence.

Just as you said, Batman and some of our other superhero movies are there's, I

think a lot of gr there within Edgar Rice Bar and his work that remains untapped,

both commercially and creatively.

So question, do you think John Carter would make

a better movie or TV show?

Especially with the technology we have now.

TV shows have come such a long way.

You look at stuff like Laura, the Rings, rings of power, like Game

of Thrones and if you utilize that technology in that budget, John

Carter could be amazing TV show.

I think most burs are rooting for a streaming show for John Carter for Tarn.

, anything that Burrows did that had a longer cycle.

Ther there were seven novels.

There were four Venus novels, which had a sort of an element of humor.

Anything that you've got enough content for a few seasons.

I think breast fans, yeah, they feel like the technology is there.

The the visuals are there, the budget is there that you could see streaming.

Some of his standalone works, his solo novels I think would

work better as a feature film.

But anything that's an ongoing continuing narrative, definitely

streaming and, and his works very episodic because these stories, a

lot of times would be serialized over five or six Pope magazines.

So he would give you two or three chapters and then this cliff hanger ending.

And it's very similar to what we see with the TV series now that

might have eight or 10 episodes.

It breaks down very similar to what the Pope Magazines were and you could

do a novel each season, for example.

That makes complete sense.

So I'm gonna pivot for a second.

What is it like being known as the Tarn guy, like the expert in all things Tarn?

It's funny.

I was always passionate about Ed Gross bro, in his works.

And I wanted to work with him down and steal my dream to get to, to have

a major role in getting this, these properties on the screen, either

as feature films or television.

That's the next great frontier for me, cuz I've written comic strips, I've written.

Nonfiction books.

I've written for the movie magazines.

I've, I've covered the making of the movies and talked to producers,

directors, writers, I've done that.

And so the, having a hand and bringing this to a new audience, a big

audience I feel is my next big goal.

Yeah.

When I moved out to LA I had written some of my own original things

thought that would be my entree.

But was 24 year old kid with a, she full of screenplays.

I'd written homemade screenplays.

I read all the books, Robert McKee's, story structure and all the classic

works on writing a screenplay.

And I was a, a writer in high school and college.

And I thought I would break in with my own stuff, but, it just, people responded.

One thing I know one of my early.

Things that sort of set my career in motion, set the

trajectory was back around 1993.

I had written an article, and I don't even remember which article it was, but

Ed's first grandson read it and he called me up and he said, Hey, we had mutual

friends, so we knew who each other were, but it was my first direct contact.

He called up and said, oh, you I read what you wrote about my grandfather.

Come on down to the office, I wanna give you a tour, because they're

still in the same offices that at Rabos built in 1927, I believe it was

a little little bungalow on Ventura Boulevard and Tarzana, California.

Burrows took his tar and money and bought a ranch and named it Tarzana.

And it's been developed into a town now and the offices are there.

So that's really what sort of I Metres grandson and we were very simpatico.

He was very passionate about the family legacy and had read

all his father grandfather's books and knew his grandfather.

He was um, I wanna say six or eight years old when Ed Gross Bros died.

So he, he had memories of Edgar Burs and burs had bequeathed him this legacy.

And he was the one that started referring me for, documentaries and news programs.

And he would get requests, and I think I was the guy he felt comfortable

with if he couldn't do it or didn't feel like doing it, passing

it on and saying, talk to Tracy.

I can't give him enough thanks for, launch me in this direction.

It's it's, burrows was always my passion in reading.

And it's it's always a revelation, even just talking to you that,

people just come up, contact me and say, I want to talk about this.

Or I just shot this summer a French documentary.

I worked on South African docu.

Tell Aeries, so those will be coming out in the coming months.

So yeah it's always just gratifying and a little bit surprising to me

when I'm approached from all these various quarters because I'm just a

humble writer just pursuing my craft.

I still research and read about its, and I read a lot more nonfiction than fiction.

I'm currently going through a lot of the old newspaper archives in the Los

Angeles area, digging up information on boroughs that even his biographers missed.

I'm just a guy who likes to read about buras and learn about boroughs

and if I, that I can share that with people to me is just the greatest.

So you mentioned that you had a lot of different scripts and different

things that you worked worked on for Tarn.

Is there like, and you have the dream of doing something on screen form,

what would be like the commer like the trailer pitch for that version of Tarn?

What would be different from, with your adaptation?

Oh, I can't give you my trade secrets, but no,

No.

Not trade secret . Not the trade, but give me some, like

a little character difference,

I think that one thing, and I think two things, I think

that it's an adventure show.

Okay.

But it needs to be character driven.

Oh, okay.

Everything on TV today is character yellow.

They have this fabulous world of Yellowstone, but you

watch it for the characters.

You wanna see what RIP is doing.

And women seem to love Rip and they love Beth too.

They love that couple, they love them individually.

. So that's the first thing is it would be character driven.

Okay.

And I think we've done the Taron, the single guy who's out, people starting,

in the Post Marino Sullivan era and the, and the producer Cy Wine tr

they never knew what to do with Jane.

They didn't want a Taron who was tied down.

They didn't want a Taron who was domestic.

And Burs even at one point later in life, said, oh, I should

never have made him domestic.

I married him off too soon.

Cuz, Taron was meeting these exotic queens, LA Oppa and

all these lost civilizations.

And here he was tied down to his wife.

I would lean into that and say, here's this guy.

He lives this fantastic life, this.

These amazing adventures, but he's happily married and he's faithful to his wife.

And you bring the wife in and you have that marital dynamic.

And he had a son who was not boy, he had an actual, he and his, he and Jane and

the novels had a biological son who grew up and, despite their best interests, to

raise him as a, you in London as young Lord Grace Oak, he ran away to Africa with

an ape and recapitulated tar in his life.

He grew up, he was 10 years old and he ran away to Africa and lived with

this ape and had all these adventures.

So I think that is the entree is the domestic side, have it more

character driven and yes, amazing adventures, but you care about the

characters and their love story.

So that's the angle I would come at it in a pitch is the family element,

the love element, and even the fast and furious movies, VIN Diesel

talks about, despite all the cars and everything, it's about family.

, they repeat that in the, it's family.

He gets that people, you can only watch so many stunts before your attention wonders.

You can only watch so much cgi.

There's gotta be a human connection.

There's gotta be a personal connection.

There's gotta be an empathy with those characters and it should be aspirational.

You want to be those characters.

You want to have Tarzan's adventures and you want to be

married to a woman like Jane.

No, that makes complete sense.

So I took it in your adaptation in your pitch.

You're not envisioning Vin Diesel for the role of Tarn.

, Tracy: I think most of burs

unknown who doesn't bring baggage.

I gotcha.

That makes sense.

Because any huge movie star you're going to see and that was interesting

thing about Scars, guard and Robby was they were just starting to

pop when Jerry Wein tr chose them.

, and I think it was right after they fi they finished filming in 2014.

The movie didn't come out until 2016.

I think they had just wrapped filming when they both hit number

one on the Imd B star meter.

And so that was a case of he had picked these people who were, just about to

pop as stars and put them in the movie.

And then they went on.

So he got them, be before it got too late in their career.

And of course, they're both, especially Margot Robbie, she's

such a chameleon, , she does, tries to seek out very diverse things.

She doesn't always play the same character.

And so that's another thing is you know, if you have a, an actor who is good with

character roles, who's more than just a movie star, Who's not just himself on

screen, but yeah, generally I would prefer someone, for any of these boroughs roles,

who's not that well known, maybe has the acting chops, can do character stuff and

has certainly has athletic credentials.

I think that's simple, complete sense as someone that you believe,

could run through the jungle, live in the jungle and so forth.

So it's a tall order, it's, yeah, it really is.

That's one reason why, you know, going with an unknown

sort of opens that up a bit.

Of course, an unknown is gamble that person, they may not deliver.

You get 'em on set and , they may not have the charisma or the

star power or the work ethic.

And so it's tough.

It's tough casting these iconic roles, and I think, we go through

that with we've seen that with Batman.

People are like, Michael Teton is Batman.

What the heck?

. And then he did it, and same thing with Robert.

Yeah.

Rubber patson.

Yeah.

, people were like the twilight guy and these guys step up and they own the role.

So certainly, you can cast, make sort of unconventional choices and it works.

Yeah, it really does.

I would be so fascinated to see what a modern day Tarn like show looks like.

Yeah.

Especially with cg, the CGI aspects of everything now.

Would you heavily lean into that?

Would you not quite lean into the CGI stuff on like how would the

apes and chimps look in the show?

That's such a fascinating like question mark in 2020, I guess 2024

or 2025, whenever that would come out,

I think still the big challenge no matter how.

Advance the CGI gets is the uncanny valley.

. That's true.

I talked about how people wanna see characters, they wanna see in their

fantasy, love, interest on screen, whether it's Margot Robbie Alexander,

scars guard, Gordon Scott, whoever you wanna see, someone you can identify with

and a have that personal element with.

And so that's the difficulty with cgi and the legend of Taron

had almost all CGI animals.

I believe there were a couple of goats in the Native village that were real . You

just, because, we've, our awareness of animal welfare is what it is.

It's, it would be very tough to put real animals in a movie again,

especially if you're talking about these species like lions gorillas.

Elephants.

, , Mm-hmm.

, it's a challenge cuz these animals, these big charismatic megaphone and

they're under tremendous stress.

They're endangered.

There are only so many of them left on the planet.

And do you take one and put it through its paces on a movie set?

Yeah.

And so definitely I think CGI for the animals, the stunts there are things

you can do with the stunts where you see tarm from the back or the side

where, you don't necessarily have to worry about the uncanny valley as much.

I think, as you alluded that with today's technology, there's certainly a way

you can seamlessly combine the stunts and so forth with actual characters

actual charismatic actors, and that was that's been something that's

tough, ca preventing talked about it.

I had interviewed him and movie's a nice little B movie.

If you haven't seen it.

Taron in the Lost City.

Casper was very game to person, very game to, he did what they asked

and Ron Heal talks about it how, you're running around in loin cloth,

there's very little to cover up.

It's hard to find a body double, you can, guy who's, walking around

with clothes, you can do a lot more cheats with the camera.

When a guy is almost naked and you're viewing him from various angles it's

hard to either find a body Dublin.

It's, I think it's gonna be hard to realistically do the CGI unless

you use some camera trickery.

And, it's very interesting, the things you can get away with tricks,

you'll sometimes notice that scenes take place at dark or in the rain.

And I think one, one, famous example of that was the giant squid attack in 20,000

leagues under the The Disney movie.

And they filmed it, out on the tank on the lot in the bright sunlight and

it looked like a giant rubber squid.

I'm like, how do we, what do we do?

So that's why they made the squid attack, at night in the rainstorm, cuz you've got

thrash and you've got flashes of light.

You've got, it heightens the danger and everything, but you can also cheat a lot.

You can hide a lot.

So I think that makes sense.

That's another element of Parson is, you've got the jungle, you've got

inclement, various inclement weather.

You've got, shadows and leaves and things you can, there are things you could do

creatively, cheat the stunts and still make it look incredible and impressive.

So what villain would you pitch for your version?

Like your ideal, not necessarily your version of Tarn, but like an

ideal Tarn villain that you would like to see in the next movie,

there was a literary villain who has popped up now and again.

I believe he was in Disney's Legend of Tarn, and he was in a couple of

the silent films called Nicholas Rock.

Okay.

And he was a Russian and he had a side kick named Povi.

They were in the second and third books, and Povi came back in the fourth book.

So they were the closest thing to ongoing nemesis Taron had.

And what was interesting was the Taron novels took off so quickly.

I have a friend who he's American, but he studied abroad in Italy

and married an Italian woman.

And I asked him one time, and he's fluent fluently, reads Italian fluently.

I said, how does Pearls read in Italian?

And he said, it reads just like American, just like the

English, like it's a page turner.

It's, the adaptations he's read are thrilling and fascinating.

And so that's what Burris found is his work translated.

And so he was being translated into French and German and

all these different languages.

So he had to try and find villains, . He didn't wanna demonize his

overseas market, so that's why, he had Russian villains because he

had not been translated in Russia.

And he had a speech guy who was a poacher in one.

And so he would always try to find these sort of obscure nationalities.

And of course, eventually his books went worldwide.

And, he atone for that in World War ii he really demonized the Germans in had

Taron fighting the Germans in British, east Africa and Germany, east Africa.

And Taron was just savage, savage against the German.

Then after the war, burs repented and started creating German

protagonists, to make up a tone for his his wartime sentiments.

So that's why, I'm digressing a bit but yeah.

Nicholas Roff, who was a sost right at the end of, right before the Communist

Revolution Tarn went up against communist agents, Joseph Stalin's agents Joseph

Stalin in the books puts out a hit on Tarn because, Tarzan's breed of individuality

doesn't mesh with, the communist ideal.

The communists wanted to take over Africa and have these satellite states, and

here was Taron standing in their way.

Tarn fought the Japanese in World War ii, in, in Sumatra.

Bur wrote an novel about that.

He was a war horse spot in the South Pacific.

And Tarn has had, a lot of epic foes in the books.

But I think people come back to, the people who read the books,

this, the Nicholas Rock off the sort of Russian double age.

And he was a nasty character.

He was blackmailing his own sister and doing whatever he could to shake

people down for money and further the cause of uh, mother Russia.

So he was a, certainly a an epic opponent for Taron.

So let me ask you a question that's always I've always

wondered this over the years.

Like I, my introduction to Tarn was the Disney movie, and then like some of the

other movies, the 1998 movie as well.

I, in the Disney movie, the antagonist was Clayton?

Yes.

Like Clayton was the antagonist.

But like in, from my understanding, the, in like the books in Clayton,

like his father, like John

Clayton.

Okay.

If you wanna get the Grace Oak lineage, we can do a brief

yeah just briefly this is just like a question

I've always had about the series.

I'm like, why did they name Clayton the bad guy in the Disney

movie when that's his father?

His

father's name was John Clayton and that was John Clayton, Lord Grey Stok.

And but he had a cousin.

What happened was the Gray Stokes are marooned in Africa and Taron is born

and adopted by the apes and raised, and the Gray Oak family believed

that side of the family is dead.

So Taron had a first cousin named William, Cecil Clayton, who was very fe and very.

Civilized.

He wasn't a bad guy, but he just bur contrasted him against tar, his

upbringing in London as Lord Grace Stoke.

Okay.

And interestingly enough, he he was on a ship with Jay when they got stranded in

Africa and that's when Taron met Jane.

So his rival for Jane's affection was his first cousin, , William Clay.

So Disney I think, adopted the name from the cousin who was a rival and

made this cousin who was not nearly so violent as the the Disney villain.

. And but yeah, it's a little tricky.

And, I always found that frustrating as someone from the books when

they take a character's name from the books that doesn't really have

anything to do with that character.

I remember years ago I was talking to a producer and he was

talking about naming characters.

And I was like why would you name a character on screen from

the book that has nothing to do with the character in the book?

I said, people who have never read the book won't care.

And people who have read the book are gonna be frustrated and curious, that

you've injustices that character.

I, I never understood why Hollywood does that sometimes is they'll name a

character or create a new character, but take a name from the books that really

has nothing to do with that character.

So I can see why there was a little confusion about Clayton.

That makes sense.

So Tracy, I have to ask you like, what is it like to have so much of your work being

published in all these really cool places?

Like you've been published, like on the Huffington Post, like Amazon H Walk like

mtv, geek, like so many cool places.

What's

that like?

I have to give credit to Titan Books, my publisher.

And Titan is very big now in, the making of books.

They do a lot of Star Wars books, any big a plus list franchise, you're probably

going to find an art book, a coffee table book by Titan about it on it, and

so they were really breaking out when.

They published my book, that was 2012, I believe.

2011.

We actually I delivered the pitch and I went through a gross Burs Inc.

Titan had been wanting to do a book about Tarzan.

And so I said, Hey, I'm the guy to write the hundred year anniversary of Tarzan.

I did a formal proposal and the people at ERB got it in Titan's Hands,

and Titan decided I was the guy.

So I really have to give credit to Titan.

They really supported this book.

They supported the franchise.

They, their publicist was the one who set me up with all these, outlets.

And it was just like I was telling you in the nineties when my friend the

grandson at would help me, get me on documentaries and news programs and stuff.

They really saw something in me and just helped me to take it to the next level.

And I'm very grateful to the whole staff of Titan from Nick Landal president.

He's a big big advocate of Edgar Rosen, his work in Tarn, and Laura Price.

She was my editor.

I believe she's the creative director now.

So they believed in me.

They got my work out there, they got the publicity out there, and

they asked me to do a second book, so I couldn't be more pleased.

I hope to do a third book with them someday.

I've been on them about doing something about John Carter and Agar

for his other works, but they, I think they really wanna wait to see

a successful TV show, streaming show or movie or something to drive it.

Because, publishing today is publishing supports TV and film.

. And so it really, if you talk to a big publisher about a book, in my experience,

they're gonna ask you two things.

What's an anniversary we can tie it to?

Or is there a movie or TV show coming out we can tie it to?

Because that's what drives the awareness.

You get tens of thousands of eyes on your.

Books, you get tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of

eyes on your film or TV shows.

That's really what drives literary these days is, the screen.

That makes sense.

So as a writer, what was it like holding your first public like

published book in your hands?

Oh, it was amazingly gratifying.

I can't describe the feeling because it took a while.

I started writing in professionally in 19 92, 93 for the magazines.

So it took about 19 years to get a book out.

We did with that, we did a proposal when Disney's Tarn was coming out to do a book

and on the history of the Tarn franchise and Disney, they were promoting their

version of Tarn, so they weren't too interested and that's understandable.

But I didn't wanna, when I'm not knocking university presses, I'm

not knocking self publishing.

Those are great outlets, small press certainly.

But I wanted to wait until all the stars were aligned to get a major publisher.

to launch me to the next level as a writer because I knew if I, I did university

press or small press, you get typecast, you get literary world shun you aside.

So it was just amazingly gratifying that, a long wait, 19 years and a lot

of proposals and I'd sent my proposal out to a agents and everything else,

so it was a lot of working a long way.

But they sent me a copy from the printer before I guess it

was a proof copy or whatever.

So I got a copy several months before the book was over here.

They're printed in China for the second book.

They didn't send me the proof.

I don't know if they forgot me or they got one but I didn't get a.

So it was just a waiting game.

And so I ordered my books, I ordered like a hundred copies to do signings

and stuff, and I got the entire order.

So that was when I cracked open the box.

I got it on my birthday May 10th, 2016 is when I ever received my copy.

So that was a nice birthday present

for the sake.

I bet that was wonderful, man.

Yeah, and I hadn't, like I said, I had not seen a proof copy,

so you're just crossing your fingers that it's gonna be as nice as the

first one cuz there's no going back.

, when I saw the thousands of copies had been printed and were

in the random books warehouse.

Yeah, it's just you can't describe the feeling.

It's a lifelong room.

It's just like seeing your name on screen on a movie or a TV show or something.

Just the culmination of years of hard work and a lot of it, and empathy,

it's, like I said, I still work, I still comb through library databases

and so forth looking for new.

Elements or aspects of Edgar Bro's life that haven't been published before.

And as a writer there's a lot of just laboring and obscurity, until that book

comes out or until your byline happens.

So it's certainly the, it makes it worthwhile.

That makes sense.

So let's I wanna transition into some advice that you can

give, like prospective writers.

What advice would you tell someone who wants to write a book

about something like a being?

To be an expert on something, like you are on a Tarn.

Read . Read.

You've got to be a good writer, you've got to be a good reader.

You've gotta be well read.

. And I think, a lot of it just comes out of your passion if you're

passionate about a subject, if you're passionate about a topic.

And another piece of advice I got from the artist, Joe DeVito, he's a painter.

He's done a couple of cars and covers, also probably best known in

the genre for his doc Savage Covers.

He does with Will Murray and he's a sculptor.

And Joe said, the best advice he received in art school was finish what you started.

Because, as artists we see shiny pretty things and we

want them and we pursue them.

And there comes a time you may be 90% through with that manuscript when

it gets hard and it stops being fun.

You have this honeymoon face when you're first learning and writing and it's fun,

but then you run up again against optics.

Maybe it's fact checking.

Maybe it's an interview you need and they won't give you, get back to you.

They're giving you the runaround or it can be any number of

obstacles you run up against and it's, and you don't wanna do it.

And you have to power through that.

Powerful.

You have to finish your script.

know, especially when you're starting out, especially when

you're, you have to prove to people.

You can write on a deadline.

I remember when I was writing for the movie magazines, I'm

a pretty meticulous writer.

I spent months on my books.

I, I, it was pretty quick turn on for the actual writing, but the first

one, I think, from the time I had a verbal, okay, we'll do this till we

sign the contract was about 10 months.

So I had 10 months to research and get my notes together.

I'd been researching for 15 years or whatever, but I had 10 months to really

get my notes together and get the book.

And for the second book, I got a verbal, okay, it was almost two years

before, cause they were syncing it up with the Legend of Taron movie.

The book came out that summer.

And so I was, researching and getting it together and I had a

little bit of a luxury of time.

But then when the actual writing comes, it comes at you fast, and you've gotta be.

Able to perform under pressure, you've gotta be able to perform under deadline.

I remember when I was writing for the movie magazines, I had a pretty good the

pretty good lead time on my articles.

And then one day the editor called me and I guess a writer had dropped

off a project and he wanted something on basically a two day turnaround.

So I had to do all the interviews.

I had to call up the publicist and line up the interviews, and they

were all waiting, ready to go.

But I had to do all these interviews and craft that into a story because,

with non-fiction It's storytelling.

You have to, I was talking about how the human interest, the human element, the

character that's always good entryway into when you're talking about whether it's

behind the scenes in a film or how film is the human element is what the people did.

And I remember I had to do this magazine of article on a two day turnaround and

it felt like such a victory to do it.

And so that's another thing for young people is be aware that you may have

the luxury of time when you're writing on spec, when you're doing your own

passionate projects, but there's gonna be a time when you have to deliver on

a clock and you better be able to do it

That's part of being professional is Is, it's great to, to putter along

and do your own fact checking and take your time and get it right.

But when the editor says it needs to be there, and I always I know I drove my

editor crazy, I always pushed up against the deadlines cuz I was always just

trying to make the book a little bit better, a little bit better, cuz like I

said, there's sometimes there's a fact.

You can't quite run that fact down.

It's gonna be an amazing, fascinating thing that nobody, who's read about these

tar and movies and there've been a couple of really good tar and film books before.

But I tried to find new stuff and you're trying to chase down this fact and you're

telling the editor, I got it, I got you have it to you by midnight tonight.

And you self-imposed these deadlines and you have to make 'em.

So that's another challenge is being able to deliver quality content on a deadline.

That's really good advice.

That is really good advice.

Let's see.

We've reached a point in the show that I like to call the Pro Nerd Reports segment.

Are you a pro nerd?

It's where Ask five questions, five random, nerdy trivia questions, and we're

gonna see how many outta five you can get.

Correct.

Are you ready?

I'm ready.

Ready,

. Sebastion: Okay, so your first question

Disney, which film is credited for the, for popularizing, the word Super.

Cal Fredi.

Sbi Lados,

Mary Poppins.

You

got it.

You got the first one, right?

Okay.

I'm one for five.

All right.

So in the world of Star Wars, the universe far away the galaxy far

away, I should say in Star Wars, what is an ATV or at T T, sorry.

Oh, it's, I can't tell you what the acronym stands

for, but it's the big walkers.

They call them the robotic things that look like an animal that walk

. Sebastion: We, I can take that.

I can take that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All train troop.

Maybe I'm

You're close Armored armored assault tank.

So you got it.

It's just like the acronym.

Yeah, the acronym is a little tricky.

Okay.

And the, and then also in the world of movies.

What is the name in Men in black of the Signature Memory Eraser device.

I did see those movies when they came out in the

theater, but I have not revisited

. Sebastion: I can understand.

You

got me there.

There have been so many movies.

What was it?

A Neuralizer.

Neuralizer.

Okay.

I'll have to remember that.

Yeah, that.

Yeah.

So yeah.

I mean you've gotten two, like two outta five correct?

So far.

I only missed one that you're doing pretty good.

Okay.

You're doing pretty good.

So your next question is, in the realm of Lord of the Rings, what is the name of the

creature who appears to drag the Wizard Gand off to his death with a flaming whip?

Is that song

No.

Oh no, but you're close.

You try another guess.

I think you're right there.

Flaming

Whip.

What is the name of the creature who appears to drag the Wizard Gand

off to his death with a flaming

whip?

It's not Goum.

No.

I give up.

I'm not strong on the tol.

I will confess

. Sebastion: It's a ball.

Rock ball.

Rock.

He was I don't know if you, in the movies, he was like a big big creature.

Almost looked very demonic.

It was completely like he was inflam and like completely inflamed.

Okay.

And so I'm like, he was like, his whole body was made outta like fire,

so to speak, like fire and Smoot.

And he would just use like a whip to basically Yeah, try, basically

try to take down the fellowship.

Yeah.

But that, I saw those

in the theater many years ago, . That was, geez, the

first one was like years ago.

It wasn't, it close to 20 years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I believe so.

I think they just hit their

anniversary.

A lot of movies between now and then.

So hit me with the,

Okay.

This one's a little tough one.

This, which actor has played the role of Alfred?

Alfred Pennyworth more than any other live action Batman films.

Pennyworth.

Oh.

Played

Alfred the Butler.

Was it Michael Kane?

No,

but that's a very good guess.

That's my favorite.

Albert Napier.

What what was the second guess?

Charles Napier.

No, but that was a good one too.

Who was it?

Michael.

Go.

Okay.

I would not have gotten that.

I, know, like gun to the head.

I wouldn't have either, but that was a really good guess cuz Yeah.

Michael Kane was my

favorite.

I did, yeah.

I did Michael Kane.

I thought he was great in the role.

Yeah, but you got two, right?

You said you, you didn't think you were gonna get any, you got two.

That's pretty good showing.

Thank you.

Yeah.

See that's the thing about being a specialist, I, I'm not a generalist.

. I've never professed to be, I watch a lot of movies.

I enjoy a lot of movies, but my field of study is very focused.

So

going back to your field of study, what would, we mentioned that an

animated version of Tarin would be cool.

Would you prefer it to be like animated, like rated G animated or more like

the adult like animation centric stuff We're getting on Netflix nowadays.

Cause now it seems like we're getting a lot of more edgier, like

more, more centered towards adults, like animated properties as well.

That's a good question.

Did you ever see the 1970s show?

Tarn, the Lord of the Jungle.

It was a filmation animation.

Oh I've never actually watched that to completion.

Like I think I've seen like little bits and pieces.

Yeah.

If you get a chance, I don't know what platform it's on.

I know the DVD is out there if you get a chance to watch that.

Cuz Phil Mush was really doing some great stuff in the seventies.

Flash Gordon, star Trek Batman they did a lot of great stuff.

And that is considered probably by fans.

The closest, the most the most authentic to the novels is the Filmation Taron.

And they had to meet the Saturday morning standards and practices.

Taron didn't carry a knife and didn't want kids playing

with knives, things like that.

There were various certain things.

Tar always would wrestle the hungry predator.

He would wrestle the lion or the black panther or the crocodile and then

toss him aside and say, get out of here, and hunk, and they would leave.

And so I have a tremendous affection for that.

And I would hate to exclude children from the experience I had.

And that's the thing about for us with Batman, you can have, I remember I was

talking to a producer who had five had.

Had I believe it was Ironman in five different series at

some point in the eighties.

And he was talking about, the different platforms and different audiences.

And so it would be great if you could have both, for bur, and like with Batman,

you see the very dark, edgy Batman, but then you see the Lego Batman and so it

would be great if we could have both.

I don't think the serious adult has been tried.

I think there's tremendous potential there in tremendous market.

I just hate to see kids excluded from that core visceral experience.

I remember when Disney's Tarn came out and I confessed, I went and I

got the Happy Meals, to get the toys.

And I remember I was in McDonald's.

And there were these little kids, and it was like all ages and all races

and all genders, boys and girls, and they were given the tars and yell

to each other across the McDonald's.

And one kid would yell it out and then across another kid would

yell it out and then another kid.

And that was just such to me, a magical moment to see little

kids giving the Tarn Yale.

And just like I said, it cut across all cultures.

It was, Tarn was something everybody could enjoy.

And that was just a special moment to me.

And I would love to see that.

Happening again.

Where kids can just have the uninhibited disinhibited running around, swinging

on vines, jumping and being athletic and climbing jungle gyms if they allow

kids to climb jungle gyms anymore.

The, all the playground equipment has rubber pads under it now.

Not when I was growing up, when you could get skinned good on a playground

equipment, but that's what I would love to see is just children being able to

buy into the myth and and enjoy it.

Appreciate it.

That makes complete sense.

I, like I was thinking while you were like talking about like the adaptation, you

would like to see this would Tarn would make a pretty cool video game nowadays.

Yeah,

yeah, definitely.

We've come so far in like games and everything like that.

I would be interested to see what a large budget studio would

be able to do with the Tarn ip.

Yeah.

And I, again, I was an adult, but I got the the Disney person Game Boy and, Oh,

that's, yeah, I used to play that and I wasn't very good because again, I was an

adult . I didn't know what I was doing.

But yeah, I love that the fact that, you.

There's so many platforms that you can bring kids in and new audiences

in and it's just ripe for that.

We didn't see that the legend of Taron, again, it was a big budget, a plus list

movie, great cast, nice adventure, but it didn't have a lot of supporting products.

Same thing with John Carter.

There just wasn't supporting product.

So that needs to happen is some studio needs to really invest in these properties

and, hit all platforms and yeah I think, there's tremendous amount of un

unmonetized and unrealized IP there.

That is just ripe for development.

It'd be really cool to see what they do with that cause yeah.

That would be really cool.

Especially a open world where you can explore like all the jungles, you

would've different like antagonists, maybe like some of the animals that he

encounters that are like antagonists in the books or maybe even like some

of its true book and like foes as well.

Yes.

I think that'd be really cool.

Tracy, it's been really fun talking to you.

Before you go though, where can the good people find you?

My primary social media platform is Facebook.

So you can either find me under Scott Tracy Griffin, or both of my

books have pages Torson on film.

It's my most active page.

That's my most recent book.

I try to post new content weekly.

I try to dig up facts about the Tarn movies and the actors in them that

maybe people either they haven't heard before or they haven't really thought

about it to give them new perspective on these films and their place in history.

And scott tracy griffin.com certainly is my website that people can learn

a little bit more about me there.

And

where can they

get the books?

The books are available?

The first book is out of print, actually, Taron Centennial Celebration.

You can get it from second party sellers on Amazon.

Okay.

Tar on Film is still in print.

You can order it on Amazon or you can ask your favorite independent retailer.

I support independent bookstores.

You can ask them to order it for you.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Tracy, thank you so much for being on the show today.

It's really nice talking to you.

Thank

you, Sebastian.

I've really enjoyed it.

Tracy, I will.

I gotta have you back sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, I will definitely keep you updated whenever this goes out.

Thank you so much for being on the show again, and I will talk to you soon.

Thanks, Sebastian.

All right, bye,

Tracy.

Bye.

Hey, what's up everyone?

Thank you so much for listening to the episode.

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I'll let your boy later.