Tales from the Podcast Stage – Fauxthentic History at Star Wars Celebration Chicago

Tales from the Podcast Stage continues with Fauxthentic History.

Tell me a bit about your Celebration experience. How many have you been to? Have you ever been on the podcast stage before (or applied but didn’t make it before)? Why did you apply to be on the podcast stage?

Bryan has only missed one North American Celebration (Celebration IV is the one that got away) and even made it to the last Celebration in Europe. This was Holly’s 4th Celebration. We’ve done Full of Sith live on the podcast stage in year’s past, but never Fauxthentic History.

We applied to do the stage because we thought we could bring a really fun hour of programming to the convention. We applied with both Full of Sith and Fauxthentic History, but Full of Sith wasn’t chosen, which was totally cool with us in that we saw a lot of the smaller shows get a chance to shine in the spotlight.

How did you prepare for the podcast stage? Did you have a set structure for the conversation? Did you invite guests? Give out SWAG? Do giveaways?

Our show is a little different than most podcasts. Fauxthentic History takes the conceit that we’re actually in whatever universe we’re talking about. Half of our episodes are Star Wars episodes and we treat the history as though it’s really happened. So every episode is, indeed, scripted, which gives it a very academic tone.

We’ve never had a guest before this episode and it was something we had to put a lot of thought into. We’d discussed doing a straight episode about Queen Amidala and her handmaidens, especially given all of the specific information about those characters she brought us in her wonderful book, Queen’s Shadow. When we asked her about it, she was game to appear as an in-universe historian named “E.L. Fhlonston.” Original, we know.

So we scripted the introduction and basic information of the show as usual and then set the rest up as an interview and we had long conversations with EK Johnston about how we’d address the show.

What were the highlights from your appearance on the podcast stage? Any big surprises (good or bad)?

The highlight of the show was that after we explained the conceit to the audience and did the brunt of our episode, we opened the floor up to questions and the entire audience was in on the gag. Every question they asked was completely in the universe.

The other big highlight was Jason Fry walking in with a confused look on his face, trying to figure out what we were doing since he’d come in a few minutes late. We talked later and he told us it only took him a few minutes to grasp what we were doing and loved it.

Is there anything you wish you would have done differently?

I wish I would have remembered to bring my cable so I could plug my Zoom directly into the board. The recording we got wasn’t my favorite, though it was totally listenable.

Will you be at Anaheim in 2020 and if so do you think you’ll apply to be on the podcast stage again?

Definitely on both counts.

Where can people find your podcast online?

They can catch us at www.fauxthentichistory.com. Our entire backlog is there and they can also find us wherever they listen to podcasts. We’ve done almost 60 episodes in total and half of them are Star Wars related. For those interested in non-Star Wars things, we’ve done everything from the Springfield Monorail system and the rise of Bavmorda to the Infinity Gauntlet and the history of Quidditch.

You can listen to the Fauxthentic History SWCC episode below!
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