Information regarding the "real life" otaku interviews (1/5/04)

[This was part of a larger Otaku no Video discussion on Anime Grapevine]

I also got the impression that the interviewee was an anime "missionary"-- spreading the word about anime to the rest of the world.

Regarding that interview segment, the onscreen text listed him as "Shon Hernandez". According to the Otaku no Video liner notes, that's a reference to Shon Howell and Lea Hernandez, "who, together with Craig York (the real person in this segment), were the core of General Products USA."

I read an interesting interview with Lea Hernandez where she talks about Craig York being filmed for Otaku no Video.

Even though "Shon Hernandez" was only a character, Lea Hernandez explains that Craig York's dialogue (that you hear in the background, as opposed to the Japanese voiceover) was unscripted, and that they just let him say whatever he wanted. Like you mentioned, what he actually says is completely different from the Japanese voiceover...except for a brief part about Lum. Craig puts his hands on his head to indicate horns, so I guess they had to have the voiceover say something similar to what was actually said so that the gesture wouldn't seem totally out of place.

Here's a snippet from page 2 of the interview:

"They knew they had a live one in this fellow Craig York. They knew they had a total, total geek. And they just turned on the camera and let him talk. And he was pouring out his heart, and they took the piss on him."

As you'll notice from the interview, Lea was quite upset at the way Gainax used Craig York in this segment, which she thought was quite insulting. Note: when she stopped working for Gainax, she was not happy with the company in general. I imagine that Gainax's side of the story may be quite different.

Here's a link to the interview (rated R for language):

From what I understand, at least one other Otaku no Video interview was more or less unscripted.

At FanimeCon 2003, Gainax-member Hiroki Sato mentioned that he was one of the Otaku no Video interviewees, and that unlike the other interviews which required some setup time, they just came to his home and starting filming. My best guess is that he was the garage kit otaku, who was listed as "Sato Hiroshi (pseudonym)". If that was him, he had quite a place ^_^;