Splitsider is thrilled to offer our first digital download, The Exquisite Corpse Project, a fantastic film from the former members of legendary sketch group Olde English. I recently sat down with the guys to look through some of their classic Olde English sketches. Here, the group looked back at an ode to friendship.
Caleb: Another sketch that relates to this movie is Perfect Night, because that was the first time that we’d worked with Chioke.
Chioke: False, but continue.
Raphael: In a major way.
Caleb: That was the first time we had worked with Chioke, using you for your talents as producer, and also to shoot the thing and make it look beautiful. You wanted to make a music video that was just like a sexy, R&B song.
Chioke: Like an Usher style.
Caleb: With like a crane and nice little beautiful shots and shit. And I really think its an amazing. I think its a really great sketch.
Raphael: It’s certainly one of our more beautiful sketches.
Chioke: And it was the one that everybody hated when we were doing it. I feel like, when we were in the process of physically making that video…
Raphael: It was hard.
Chioke: Everyone was like, “Why are we doing this? This is the worst. I can’t believe it. Let’s go home.”
Adam: It was a disaster of a production process. We rented an apartment and we ran out of time and we had to shoot a lot of it on a different day and we had to update the camera firmware when we started.
Chioke: Yeah, it was a huge, huge ordeal.
Caleb: That was the first and last time we like hired someone out to help like produce shit, was Chioke. And we were like, never working with that guy again.
Adam: It was mostly because I was directing and producing it and I was unequipped to do it, because I’m not very good at those things.
Raphael: And you were the star of it.
Adam: And yeah, so that was the big problem.
Raphael: But it came out beautifully.
Adam: Yeah, it came out really well. It was the first thing we shot in HD, which was a big deal in 2008.
Chioke: This was before that was standard. At the time, it felt like every video you saw looked like someone shot on their handicam.
Raphael: One of the things I really love about that sketch is how sincere it is. It’s this tribute to friendship, and I think a lot of people start watching it and think it’s gonna be a gay thing. Nope. It’s just a guy singing a love song to his bro, in a really sincere way. It’s not like, “haha, look at them. They’re in love with each other.” It’s like, yeah, it’s great to have your buddies.
Caleb: And I remember after we posted it, there were comments on the message board that would be like, “I just went through a breakup and this really made me happy.” “My friend got broken up with. I showed him the video and it meant a lot to him.” So that was like one of those sketches that really sort of affected people that were in a similar state.
Chioke: I think for all the making fun of things, there’s never really like a mean-spirited to the pieces. It’s not like, Michel Gondry’s the worst. It’s like, we love him. I feel like when I was watching a lot of the sketches, they’re tongue-in-cheek or you’re making fun of something as an idea or a behavior, but it didn’t ever really feel like, we’re gonna just take this person to task.
The Exquisite Corpse Project is available for download for $5 from Splitsider Presents.
