Directors Notes: The October Monologues (Patreon)

(as always Director’s Notes may contain spoilers)

Back in 2016, when we wrote episode 85 – The April Monologues, Joseph and I had a conversation about which characters to include in it. Two years prior, we had done our first “The ____ Monologues” episode featuring the Faceless Old Woman, Michelle Nguyen, and Steve Carlsberg, and we weren’t sure if that second Monologues episode should be the same characters or different ones. 

By doing a second Monologues episode, it implied there would be more Monologues episodes, and if we kept the same three characters, it would also imply that they would remain the same three voices of all future Monologues episodes. Honestly, I don’t think that has to be the case, but ritual and repetition are important to us humans. So it would certainly be nice to keep the structure intact. 

We decided to keep those same three voices for episode 85 back in 2016, and here in 2020 as we made our third Monologues installment, here they are again. We decided this for a few reasons: 

1) By focusing on those three characters, we could take a macro view of Night Vale’s growth as a town with a micro view of the growth of each of these characters. Each Monologues episode, those characters have a similar angle (FOW is haunting a single person; Michelle is talking about music; Steve sees glowing arrows in the sky), but there’s always room to write in some growth there (FOW is understanding her loneliness in an existence surrounded by people; Michelle’s musical tastes are changing; Steve is slowing healing from his years of conflict with Cecil)

2) The recording process is much easier sticking with these three characters, because we know the actors & their home recording set-up. 

3) It’s super fun to write for Mara Wilson, Kate Jones, and Hal Lublin. These Monologues episodes are a blast to make, and I’m not sure why we’ve only done three of them in 6 years. 

These monologues give us some time away from Cecil’s narration of Night Vale. Cecil Palmer is a great radio host, to be sure, but it’s always nice to get into the heads of others in Night Vale. Check in on them, see how they’re doing. I love that Michelle can admit to liking a Radiohead song, that Steve can forgive even if he can’t forget, and that the Faceless Old Woman remains as helpful as ever to all the young, aimless men in town. 

Hope you enjoy this episode, and October (the spookiest and best month of them all).

-Jeffrey Cranor
October 1, 2020