‘Galavant’ a knight move for TV writer
Growing up in the 1970s and ’80s in Grandview Heights, John Hoberg wanted to be just like his grandfather: a fighter pilot with a sharp sense of humor.
Hoberg, a resident of Pasadena, Calif., is one for two.
He never became a fighter pilot (although he did recently get a pilot’s license), but he has built a TV career out of being funny.
Along with his wife, Kat Likkel, Hoberg is a writer and an executive producer for Galavant, a goofy new musical series set in medieval times.
In addition to music by Alan Menken (of The Little Mermaid and Aladdin), the ABC show features a slew of recognizable guest stars — including John Stamos ( Full House).
The eight-episode comedy
See
Page
kicked off on Jan. 4 with back-to-back episodes and will continue in a similar fashion on Sunday nights through Jan. 25. (This weekend, “Weird Al” Yankovic and funnyman Ricky Gervais are featured.)
Hoberg — who has also worked on other TV shows, such as My Name Is Earl and Hope & Faith — spoke recently by phone about his career.
Q: How did you end up working with your wife?
A: We started writing separately. We both wrote kids TV for a while, separately. Everybody said, “You guys are going to write together.” . . . We teamed up probably in 2002 or 2003.
My wife, she grew up in Michigan, but she has become an Ohio State Buckeye fan. And I swear that’s the thing my parents are most proud of.
Q: So, as a Buckeye fan yourself, you traveled to Texas for the College Football Playoff national championship game. Did you go to Ohio State University?
A: No, but I grew up in Grandview. Everybody around me went to Ohio State. . . . I went to Skidmore College (in upstate New York).
Q: How did you like working on
A: It was really amazing. Kat and I went to England — moved to England for about four months to oversee production for the show.
It was almost like a study-abroad program for television.
Q: How did filming in England differ from doing so in Hollywood?
A: The hours are very strict there. . . . If you start at 7:30, you end at 7:30. At 7:35, unless you ask every member of the crew, . . . they start packing up.
In Hollywood, you just pay overtime. Everything is so controlled in Hollywood — which is great.
It’s almost like you’re winging it a little bit more (in England). At one point, we were in a castle. We had Ricky Gervais doing an episode, . . . and, while we were filming, a school tour was coming through. That wouldn’t happen in Hollywood.
Q: How would you describe working on something that finishes within a month?
A: You are almost at this camp. You’re off in another country, making this thing you know is limited. You don’t want to miss a moment. Really, you only have four weeks to hook people and to show everything you’ve got. Q: Is another season of
in store? A: We don’t know, but the hope is that we’ll do another season.
The dream would be to think of this as a comedic Game of Thrones. We’re hoping it goes to maybe Italy or the south of France. That might be a better place than rainy England. But that is the hope — that we’ll do more of these.