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MM: Do you get to do side engagements and speak at other places besides
Good Eats?
DD: Yeah. No, nobody's invited me as a nutritional anthropologist. I do it as part
of my job on the other things that I do. But it's funny. Nobody's ever
invited me for
[nutritional anthropology]. That's why I was surprised when
you said that there are fans out there because you're the first person ever
to approach me like that. I get an email once in awhile from a student
saying, "how can I learn more about nutritional anthropology?"
But I never
have been invited to give a talk or presentation even though I
do it all the
time.
CC: That's really unusual, I think. I know in our group [GEFP Message Board] that
there's ... I don't know. It's just weird.
MM: We have an eclectic group.
CC: We do have a very eclectic group.
DD: Maybe so. It's kind of funny because there have been times where I've been
invited ... like a few years ago I was a key note speaker at the Georgia
Archivist's Association meeting on Jekyll Island. So they brought me down to
Jekyll Island and I got up to give my talk which is about my other work about
population change and archiving and that kind of thing. And the person that
was the present of the group was introducing me and she talks about all my
other work that I've done and she said,
"And she's also on my favorite
television show, Good Eats!"
[Laughter]
DD: Okay! And another thing that's funny is in my work as a nutritional
anthropologist, nobody knows me on television. They don't watch shows
like that. I was at a USCA Conference a couple of weeks ago—we were both
there—and not one person, all those people who all they do is work with
food, and there were a thousand people there, not one person ... not that I
ask. But you would have thought in a group like that someone
would have
come up to me and said, "oh, you know, I've seen you,"
because I'm
wearing a name tag.
CC: "I've seen you before."
DD: Yeah. And I get that "look" sometimes out in public like, "where do I know
you from?" But that's about it. [chuckles] Which is fine with me. I'm not
looking for any ...
MM: Paparazzi.
DD: No. I don't need that stuff.
[Laughter]
MM: Besides teaching and research, is there any other field in the sector that
a person could do with a nutritional anthropologist degree that specialty
study of food? A company or other group?
DD: Um, I guess government. There might be a government job. I don't think
there's really a niche job you could find outside of academia.
MM: Does the research that you do flow into any industry sectors? Can
someone study this to somehow improve something or other?
DD: Well, there is one food company, Melissa's Foods, that imports unusual foods
from around the world. A company like that might have a nutritional
anthropologist on the staff. Every once in awhile they'll call us or send us
samples and ask us to try them out. So if you were in that kind of specialty
market ...
MM: Someone asked, "What is Nutrition Education for New Americans
Project?
DD: That is our project with the US Department of Agriculture which develops
and disseminates culturally appropriate nutrition education materials for
refugees and immigrants. And we also do nutrition education in the public
schools. And if you'd like, I can take you downstairs and show you some of
our materials. Have you seen our website?
MM: No.
DD: It's a new website: multiculturalhealth.org. And we have materials in 37
languages that we put together. Because refugees and immigrants come to
this country healthier than most Americans and in a few years their health
deteriorates to the same level as Americans. And it's probably because they
start eating like we do ... [laughs] ... which isn't every well.
MM: Are there any other activities you're involved in besides Good Eats in
your research here?
DD: That's nutritional anthropology?
MM: Um, hm ... or that you can share?
DD: Oh, there's GPANN. People who are interested in nutrition and want to be
involved in it in the state of Georgia might be interested in this: The Georgia
Physical Activity and Nutrition Network. I'm involved in that. And that's a
coalition of people who do all kinds of nutrition education, physical activity,
that kind of thing. We come together every three months and have a big
meeting and it's pretty fun, yeah. The next meeting is April 2nd at 10 o'clock
in the Dekalb County board of Health.
MM: I don't know how to transcribe that fast so it might be over by the time it
comes out. Do you have any other educational questions, CC?
CC: No.
MM: One last question, are you a Panthers fan?
DD: [laughs] We have a basketball team, right?
CC: That's basketball, right?
DD: [still chuckling] I'll have to say yes. I'm not against them.
[laughter]
MM: That's great. That's great. Well, you told us how you hooked up with Good
Eats, someone gave you a call. What was your first meeting with Alton like?
DD: It was fun.
MM: Where did you meet him?
DD: He came to my office. My office was in another building at that point. He
came to my office and we just talked. He asked me about myself and told me
about what he was doing. And we just clicked. We had good chemistry. In
fact, he did our first video for us.
CC: Yeah?
DD: Yeah.
CC: Wow.
MM: What video is that?
DD: One of the things we do is educational videos. We were talking about this ...
When we were on the shoot for the pilot I said to him while were just on
the break waiting for them to change film or something I said,
"what are
you going to do after this is shot?" And he said,
"Well, you know, I'm going
to have something." And I said, "How are you going to make a living until
this thing gets sold?" And he said, "I'll just do whatever I can do. I'll be a
chef. I'll direct commercials again." Because, you know, that was his
background. "I'll do that again or be a cameraman or whatever I can get."
And I said,
"Well, I want to do an educational video. Do you want to
write it and direct it?" And he did. And that's the first one [indicating the
video I have in my hand], The Food Pyramid. And he came up with this idea,
which was great, where we actually built a pyramid. It was 10 feet tall. It
was huge. And he came up with this idea of Mickey and Moe who are two
construction workers and they are building a pyramid. And Mickey is thin and
fit and eats he all the right stuff and Moe is big and fat and smokes and he
doesn't eat anything right. He doesn't have any energy. And so they are
working together. And they build these huge pieces of the food pyramid and
then they pour all the foods in that go in that section. Do you want to watch
it?
MM: Uh, yeah.
DD: I'll give it to you as a sample.
MM: I can send it back to you through the mail.
DD: Okay. And if people who are big Alton fans want to see one of his early
works, they can buy it from us for $15. Now you would get the whole
package, the other two that Alton didn't do. Because by then he had a show
and he's too good for us now. [tongue-in-cheek]
MM: Here's a bunch of questions I'm going to throw together and you can
answer them as you like. Describe the steps involved in your typical Good
Eats appearance. Do they contact you in advance and film all of your
occurrences at once or do you just show up on the set for that particular
episode? Also, do you and AB collaborate on your lines or does he give
you free rein? Do you help him study? Does he tell you everything you're
going to say? How's that all work out?
DD: Okay. Usually they'll call me about a week in advance and say Alton's written
me into a scene. Alton never calls me. Every once in awhile if I haven't
heard from him in awhile he'll send me a little email just saying,
"Hi, how ya
doing?" But we're doing the show and say,
"He's written you in
and which day is better for you? Wednesday or Thursday? Are you going to be
in town?" That kind of thing. So we'll set up a basic time.
Then they'll send me a script and I'll memorize my lines. And if I have a
problem with it ... And sometimes he'll write and say,
"I just want you to say
something about this food" and I'll do my own research. In the old days,
that's how we used to do it. It was more on the fly. And now he has a
research assistant and everything is timed to the last second. So you probably
noticed that the shows are tighter than they used to be. So he'll send me the
lines and if I disagree ... like, the clam show ... I always double check the
facts and that one I couldn't find any other sources for what was originally
written. So I rewrote it for what I wanted to say. So we work together on it.
I usually change it somewhat.
Sometimes he writes things that I can't say. Nobody can talk like Alton
talks. He talks so fast and he talks in tongue-twisters. Some of those lines are
just tongue twisters. And I'll say, "You know, I just can't say that." And
sometimes he's sitting there, "you've got to say it twice as fast as you're
speaking." I can't do that. He gives me a lot of
rein with the lines.
MM: And how does the shoot go?
DD: Well, the shoots are great fun. They give me a call time and that means, ‘be
here at 8', ‘be here at 1', whatever. And that's when they say they'll need
me. But usually they just want me there because they're shooting a scene
before me at that point. So I wait around and wait around and wait around.
Like a couple of weeks ago, I was at this meeting in USDA, I actually left
the meetings from Washington for 12 hours to fly back to Atlanta, do a shoot,
and go back to Washington. And when I got there, they were already
shooting another scene ... this was on a sound stage ... they were already
shooting another scene and they were deep in the middle of that and they
didn't get to me until almost the time that I had to leave because I had a
flight back. I ended up having to catch a later flight as it turned out. But we
had to cut the scene short because I didn't have time to wait.
But usually I just have to go there and expect to wait and wait. And then
we shoot my scene and then I go. [laughs] It's fun. I mean, it's really fun. The
set is a lot of fun. Everybody's happy. Everyone's in a good mood. There's no
fooling around. I mean, it's business. But it's nice. It's a very nice
atmosphere. I really like everybody. What were your other questions? It was
like a multi-part question.
MM: Generally, just how that whole process worked with you in the scenes.
DD: Oh and also, it's usually I go for one day for one show. But a few times
they've put it together. Like the beets show and the casserole show my
scenes were both shot the same day there. Last week I had a shot with no
lines.
CC: [laughs]
DD: Can you believe it? I had to go there ...
CC: ... and wait around to be shot with no lines. [laughs even harder]
DD: ... to sit in a chair. [laughs]
MM: Is he working you out of the show? [laughs]
DD: You'll have to see it. It's going to be the show on grains.
MM: So do you like set shoots or location shoots? Because you've been to
Florida and ...
DD: Yeah. I wish they'd invite me back on a road trip. They took me to Florida
for those two shows and they never invited me again. [mocks sadness]
CC: [empathizing] Ahhh.
DD: [laughs] That was fun. That was fun. Yeah, I like the location shoots and the
shoots on the sets. I like them all. Last week I was on a sound stage. That was
new for me.
MM: So in the old days he used to ask you to do some of the research and come
up with your own stuff.
DD: Yeah, he'd call me up and say, "What can you tell me about potatoes. What
do you think would be interesting?"
MM: Is there anything really strange that he's ask you to research?
DD: Not really.
MM: Have there been any shows in the past has information that is now
incorrect due to new research?
DD: No. I can't think of anything that we've said that would be wrong now.
MM: Do you have a favorite episode?
DD: Do I? That I'm in?
MM: No. That's you're in or not in.
DD: Oh, gee. To tell you the truth, I don't watch it all the time. [laughs] I really
liked that corn episode. That was fun to do.
MM: Where was the corn show filmed?
DD: It was in Florida near West Palm Beach. We shot that in November and
there's no corn up here. And the only corn they could find in the United
States was in Florida so that's why we went down there. And we got out to
the field and the corn was this high [indicates really low]. And we thought
[laughing],
"Oh, no. How are we going to shoot around corn that big?" And
luckily, there were a bunch of farms and we drove through all of these big
farms and found way in the back we found some that was like this high
[indicates a little higher].
When you think of corn in the mid-west you think
of huge, huge stalks. Florida corn is not that tall. So they had to
shoot it
special to make it look bigger that it really was.
MM: Now that show had an outtake in it with you saying "snake" or
something and he jumped. Now was that scripted?
DD: That was sort of a little joke. That was just a joke. I think I did see a snake
and then we made it into a gag. [chuckles]
MM: So tell us what you thought about having a daughter. Is this a daughter
you would have like to have had in real life? Does she look like you?
DD: She was a beautiful woman, wasn't she? Sure, why not.
[laughter]
MM: Is there something that's been really fun on one of the sets that you really
enjoyed?
DD: I enjoy every one of them. Like, I really enjoyed when we did the sugar
show. Being in a sugar cane field and being in a plant. As part of the show he
had a tour of the plant. But we had a bigger tour of the plant and we just
show you the highlights. That was fascinating. And the oats show ...
MM: I was going to ask you about that.
DD: I'm scared of horses.
CC: No way.
DD: Yeah. They called me up and they said, "We're going to dress you up in an
English riding outfit and put you on a horse." And they thought,
"Isn't this
going to be fun?" And I said, "In the first place, I don't like those English
riding outfits because it's for fox hunting and don't like fox hunting. I don't
like cruelty to animals and I'm afraid of horses." And they said,
"Too bad,
you're going to do it anyway." [laughs] So they had me in those ... I don't
know if you've ever wore one of those outfits. Those pants are so tight and
you're walking like this. And somehow I'm supposed to get myself up on a
horse? And they gave me the gentlest, nicest horse and I was
scared stiff the
whole time. They had a hard time shooting that.
MM: I've met both the horses. In Your Dreams was a really ... I met the lady who
runs the place. It's a very nice facility.
DD: She was. She helped put me at ease a lot.
MM: If you don't know, CC, it's horse farm for kids who are mentally unstable or
learning challenged or physically ...
DD: Kids with problems, various kinds of problems. Sometimes even autistic kids
who have trouble relating to people can relate to an animal.
MM: Did you ever have anything go really wrong on the set? Or in the field
once? Have a bad day?
DD: No. It really amazes me. They really do their work ahead of time. I mean, all
I have to do is show up. It's so easy. Even the onion show which I think is
the second show I was in. And we shot it down in an onion field down in
Vidalia. That scene that Alton and I are in, we're on top of an onion truck.
[begins looking] I think I still have a picture. Yeah. My mother came along
and she took this shot because she thought it was so amazing that we would
shoot up there. We climbed up to the top of the truck. We climbed up a
ladder. And we're actually lying on a bunch of onions.
CC: That's cool.
DD: But when I got there, they had the lights, they had the camera, they had
the ladder, and all I had to do was lie back and say my lines. And my eyes
were closed because the sun was in my eyes.
MM: Did you get to meet Yumion?
DD: No, I wasn't there for that.
CC: Aw, darn.
DD: Yeah, I know. I never get to meet these neat characters. I'm usually there just by myself. Just me and Alton.
MM: When you're on the set, is there food around that they're making for the
show you can eat?
DD: A couple of times that's happened, like the clam show. But usually, no.
Remember, I'm usually on location; I'm not in the set. But there is food all
over. Of course, any TV shoot there's a lot of food because you don't want
people running out to get something to eat. So they always have a lot of food
there. But they have the best lunches. I love it when they invite me at lunch
time. They used to do it themselves. You remember they guy who was the
Mad French Chef?
MM: Steve Rooney.
DD: Yeah. That was his job. He had two roles: he was the Mad French Chef and
he was Craft Services. They would shoot in this house and the basement
would just be Craft Services. You could go down there and get wonderful
food. And the turkey show, we ate leftover turkey the next day. That was
great. That was good turkey, my first brined turkey.
MM: Yeah. I've made it twice. It's delicious.
DD: Yeah. It's become a family tradition for us. But it's worth it. But there's
usually not food around for my shoots because my shoots don't involve food.
We talk about food but we're not eating it usually. Now that he's gone big
time, he's got a catering service.
MM: How about I go down through each of the shows you've been in and say
something that might be something you want to relate for each show.
DD: Okay.
MM: You've already mentioned the onion show and the sugar show
and the
oats show. What about American
Pickle?
DD: Oh, the problem with the sugar show is really hard because we had no lines
yet. We were really shooting by the seat of our pants and the sun was going
down. And when we got there, they were expecting us but for some reason
... well, this is the worst thing that's ever happened. You were asking for
something that went wrong.
We went and did corn and sugar in the same day.
Corn took longer than
we expected partly because we had to find a corn field. We went to, like I
said, the short corn. And then we had a lot of outtakes. I don't know. It was
just hard to film. There were things happening: planes going overhead and
things like that. So the shoot took longer than expected.
We got to the sugar fields and they were harvesting it. I remember there
was scene were they were harvesting it. They weren't supposed to be there.
And they were big and they were loud. And so we couldn't shoot while they
were around. The guy who was in charge of the fields said,
"I'm not going to
do anything about that. We really need to do it. We waited around for you
..." So we had these big machines. We couldn't shoot because of that. The
sun started going down and it was getting late in the day. It's November. The
days are short. And that was really touchy. That scene we shot was really by
the seat of our pants because we had to get something before the sun went
down.
MM: Did you have to go back and do any voiceovers?
DD: I've only had to do that once and that was with the oats show because I
think my voice was quavering up on that horse.
[laughter]
MM: American Pickle? The pickle show?
DD: That was a rough one, too. In that show I wasn't in the original script. And
later in the editing it came up short and so they had to film a new scene. And
Alton said let's bring me in for that. He was trying to revisit the original
potato show for some reason. We went back to the same road. And he was
trying to get some sort of gag out of it being the same place: doesn't this
look familiar. But, I don't know. It just wasn't working. And also, it wasn't
the same. Because where there had just been a big empty field before there
was now a house and they had cut down the weeds and they'd put in a pond
and all kind of things. It really wasn't the same. So that was a real tough
shoot even though it was like the last minute thrown in.
MM: My favorite of all time, Romancing the Bird.
DD: Oh, yeah. That's a good one.
MM: It was one of the first ones you did.
DD: Right. That was in the first season at the first Good Eats house.
MM: And you were sitting there with Marsha Brady Brown ...
DD: Yeah.
[laughter]
DD: That was really fun. And that was the first one I ever shot in the house, on
the set, because the others were on location. It was fun to do that one.
MM: And you were speaking honestly about your liking "tradition" as opposed
to "authentic". The scene, I think, had it set where you were talking
about the pilgrims and they were eating eels and venison and all that
stuff. And Marsha wanted to be "authentic" and you were discussing
traditional. Did that come from you or do you even remember that far
back?
DD: Right. Was it authentic and what is traditional? She wanted to be
traditional ...
CC: Yeah. She wanted the turkey and all that stuff ...
DD: Right. Right. And I was for being authentic. And that is true. I hate tradition.
It's so boring. [laughs]
CC: Deep Purple was a good show. I liked that one. Eggplant. That's probably the
first show that I really ...
DD: Got into it?
CC: ... I mean, I really already liked Good Eats to begin with but it was the first I
really time picked up on your impression of the show.
DD: That's interesting.
CC: I really don't know why.
DD: It was like the fifth season, wasn't it?
CC: Yeah. I don't know why. I guess it was something that ... I had been so
interested in the food and caught up in everything else, I really never paid
attention to any of the other background before. And then the more and
more I started looking at going towards my major, that particular episode
where you're in the window and I was just like,
"That's just so hilarious."
DD: That was funny, wasn't it?
CC: [laughs] I like that, definitely, a lot ...
DD: I like doing the comedy. It is fun. [laughing]
MM: Let's see: Flap Jack Do It Again. Pancakes. You're sitting on a rock?
DD: Yeah.
MM: Where was that filmed?
DD: That was filmed, actually, right around the corner from the old Good Eats
house. Down at the end of the street there's this little rustic area of this old
house. And actually we shot two shows that day. I was supposed to be on the
barbeque show and for some reason he cut my scene. I don't know why.
What was my scene just ended up being a tidbit so maybe it ran long and he
cut it. I don't know. But he wanted me to cook on a flat rock and I had
questions about that because I don't really consider that the first cooked
food. That was my line. "May have been the first cooked food." And I said,
"I don't think so." And they said, "Emphasis on ‘may.' May have been".
[chuckles] That was my big monologue. They made a big fuss about that.
"This is your big chance! You have a monologue!"
[laughter]
DD: And that stone wasn't even hot. They had the flames underneath it and they
couldn't understand why it didn't heat right up. And I said,
"You know, when
you cook on rocks, ..." I don't know if you've ever cooked on rocks. I have.
You have to let them heat up a couple of days to get them up to heat.
MM: The first time I saw you, because I didn't start watching until December
of '99, was the cake show, It's A Wonderful Cake.
CC: Yeah.
DD: Oh, the fruitcake.
MM: You're walking through the Christmas trees.
DD: Yeah, that was fun. We had a lot of fun that day. His wife was really
pregnant at that point. Really pregnant. She was the first producer for the
show. So she was always there at the beginning at every show. And she is a
delightful person. So nice. And it was funny because she was so big and
Ramon, the steady-camera operator who's been on some of the shows,
Ramon was there with his steady-cam and she was saying,
"Boy, I wish I
could rest "this" on it." Because between shoots he rested on a tripod type
thing. That's what I remember most about that show. Wandering up and
down those Christmas tree lanes. It was fun.
MM: The most interesting one I thought you were in was the history of
cabbage. About how different cultures took the same species and
developed its own thing.
DD: It is fascinating. That's one where I insisted on talking about that. But I
screwed up my lines real badly. I never said the Latin name of cabbage even
though we took it over and over again. I never got it right.
MM: What's the Latin name?
DD: Um, the second word is oleracea. [pauses and then laughs] I can't remember
the first word. Brassica. Brassica oleracea.
CC: There you go.
MM: I'll double check that. I don't know how to spell it.
CC: I was going to say, I'm going to have to look that up now, right?
DD: He was so mad at me. I could never get it right. [chuckling]
MM: Walking out in a field of Strawberry Sky.
CC: I liked that.
DD: Oh, you liked that?
CC: I liked that one.
DD: Oh, good. That was funny. They called me two days in advance and they
wanted me to bring a group with me. And he's always been interested in my
wild food stuff. And he's tried to get through the Food Network executives
to do a one hour special on wild foods.
MM: That's be cool.
CC: That would be so neat.
DD: I know. I'd love that. Well, send him an email about it because I think it
would be fun, too. I think he ended up doing that with his Hawaii show. He
sort of ended up doing that [making an hour show]. But that was kind of the
idea; I'm leading a wild edibles hike.
MM: Do you do that?
DD: Yeah. I do. But my mother was in it and my two nieces were the two kids ...
CC: The tie-died kid girls?
DD: Yeah. Those are my nieces. And my mother was in it. Luey, the young man
with the bandana on his head, was my grad student at that point. He's
graduated and moved away.
MM: Can I have their names so I can publish them on those episodes?
DD: I don't see why not. Luey Rotsos. He now lives in Washington. My mother is
Edna Duchon. [nieces names withheld] And there were two other people.
There was another woman who was the wife of the camp manager. We
filmed it at a Boy Scout camp way out in Newton County and her husband
was the manager there. And she's a student. And was there one other person
in that shot? I can't remember. I think that was it. And it was funny because
...
CC: And Alton being creepy.
DD: Oh, that's right. That was the other person ... with his ZZ Top beard.
CC: [laughs] That was the funniest thing I've ever saw. I was like, what is he
doing?
DD: But that show was really frustrating and embarrassing for me because the
show we did before that was the first year he had a wardrobe mistress. I had
always just brought pants and a shirt and just brought a couple of other things
and we decided what would look best on camera. The show before that he
suddenly had a wardrobe mistress, Mandy. And she had bought all these
clothes; I guess it was the clam show. And I spent half the time when were
shooting the clam show just trying clothes on. And she said,
"From now on
you've got this kind of a uniform, that you'll always wear the same thing and
you don't have to worry about your clothes anymore." And I thought,
"Wow,
this is cool." So I went to the strawberry show thinking that and wearing that
old black muumuu because I was going to change. And that's what I ended up
having to wear on camera.
CC & MM: Oh, no! [laughs]
MM: She didn't provide anything.
DD: "No, no. She's not in on this show." I was like, "What!"
CC: "Why don't you even tell me these things!"
DD: That's right.
CC: "I'm a woman for Pete's sake!"
[they both laugh]
MM: Are you in Behind the Bird? The sequel to the turkey show?
DD: [shakes her head]
MM: I didn't think so.
DD: I'm not in enough shows.
MM: Okay.
CC: You're not. You're not. I don't think you are.
DD: I don't think I am.
MM: [counting] I guess you're in 13 shows.
DD: See, that's not enough.
CC: Let's see, there's 86 shows?
MM: 86 shows up to this point.
DD: Yeah. See, they act like everybody knows me and I say, "You know, I'm
really not in enough shows. You need to put my name on everyone because
you can't count on people knowing who I am."
MM: Second to last one: Casserole Over. The casserole show. Any interesting
tidbits about that?
DD: That was interesting. I always wondered how they do that with TV. I mean,
they had taken a car and they took out the windshield and they set up the
camera so you're looking right at it. It was an interesting experience.
CC: That was the one where everybody after that particular one aired was going,
"What's the deal with the African dude sitting in the back of the car?"
DD: Yeah, nobody got the joke on that.
CC: Nobody got it. I mean, I got it. [laughing]
MM: If they had mentioned or referenced it somehow, we would have gotten it.
Like, "I'm here on an anthropology mission" or something in Africa.
CC: But they're like, she's just driving around in Atlanta? What's she doing with
this guy back there?
DD: But I do that. I do drive around with refugees and immigrants.
MM: Tell us about the clam show.
DD: I think that was the first time I was in the second Good Eats house. It was a
wondrous experience. That is a wondrous house. That was the one where I
spent more time changing clothes than anything else.
CC: Yeah, but you got to eat clams out of it.
DD: Yeah. We got to eat those clams. They were good. Alton wanted me to eat
them on screen while I was talking. And I said can't. Now since that I've
become much more aware of people eating on screen and how do you do
that. How do you fit eating in with lines. I've become much more aware of
how things are shot, and theater stuff. And the beet show.
CC: And the beet show. That was good. I liked that show.
DD: And the eggplant show.
CC: Deep Purple.
DD: That beet show, that was a hard one to shoot. Because we were walking
around this bend and, I don't know, and he wanted to work in that line in the
original script I said something about size. And he says,
"Oh, Deb. Size
doesn't matter." And then I just go on and keep talking. And I said,
"Alton,
how can you something like that and not have me react?"
[laughter]
CC: Exactly.
DD: So, we played around with a few ideas before we had the idea that I just
look at him and say, "Who told you that?"
[laughter]
DD: And I couldn't get that line right because he just wanted me to look at him
straight and say, "Who told you that?" And for some reason I felt I had to
react, I had to emote. And he was ready to kill me because I was like,
[over-reacting]
"Huh! Who told you THAT!"
[lauther]
DD: He'd say, "Deb, just say it straight." [laughing]
MM: Did you do any acting before Good Eats? Have you ever been on screen
before?
DD: When I was a kid.
MM: What did you think about being on TV the first time he approached you
with ...
DD: I went, YEAH!!!!!
[laughter]
MM: Cool. And you want to do it more?
DD: Yeah. I love it.
CC: I'm sure everybody would love to see you more. Definitely.
DD: Oh, good.
CC: They should do an hour special about wild foods. If they can get Al Roker to
do those crazy things that he does ...
DD: [tongue in cheek] Who's Al Roker?
CC: But you would be much more interesting, though. Because you actually know
what you're talking about.
DD: Yeah. I've lived on those things. I've gone into the woods and eaten nothing
but wild stuff for days at a time.
CC: Maybe they could have, like, a diary set up where they followed you around
for a week and a half. That'd be cool.
DD: [chuckling]
CC: The diary of Deb Duchon.
DD: Well, right now I've just got to work on my book.
MM: When's that going to come out?
DD: Oh, I'm still writing the second draft of the proposal. We have to find a
publisher. And then once we find a publisher, it'll probably take me 6 to 8
months to write it.
MM: So you really haven't started the written part?
DD: Well, I've written a couple of sample chapters. That's what you do. You
write a proposal. It's a very complex procedure. You first find an agent
because you can't just go to the publishers by yourself. And then the agent
helps you write a proposal and then the proposal is like a grant proposal like
what I write for work here. They're pretty extensive. You have to outline
every chapter. You have to show them all the other books that have been
published that are similar. You have to tell them how they should market it.
You have to go into a lot of detail. And then you have to do a couple of
sample chapters.
MM: So, you can't just up and write one and say, "Here's a book. I've written it?"
DD: Um, ... I guess you could.
MM: I've really enjoyed it.
DD: I've enjoyed meeting you.
CC: Yes. Thanks.
DD: Stop by anytime.
MM: You'll probably see a lot more of her [CC] than me after this.
DD: I guess so.
CC: Well, now that I know the anthropology lab over there, I'll be over here all
the time.
MM: Your door is wide open all the time.
TE: That's because of me. I'm in the wheel chair, you know ...
DD: Oh, no. I work with the door open anyway. Most of us do. It's not like I'm in
danger here or anything.
MM: Well, anyone can just walk off the street down there.
DD: Nobody does that, though. I sometimes think I'd like to write a novel, like a
mystery novel? And the main character would be an anthropologist, a female
anthropologist. But she's married to this abusive man. And so she goes to get
help, but everybody says, "The best thing to do is leave town." But when
you've got a good job, you don't want to leave town. So she decides that
her office, and I'm thinking it's like this office, she could live here. I could
live here. You've have a little kitchen up there, you've got the gym down
the street. And we have pretty good security. I mean, to get into this
building at night would be really hard, and there's always people around. And
then there would be a mystery at the university. Have you ever been to the
food lab of the 6th floor of Kell Hall?
CC: Yes.
DD: That is a spooky, spooky place.
CC: Yes, and that building is spook to begin with. Just so you know [MM], it used
to be a parking deck. And so all of the hallways are slanted like inside of a
parking deck.
DD: Right. You're always going up and down ramps.
MM: Weird.
CC: And then there's all of this exposed duct work and the labs are just scary,
scary.
DD: And no windows.
CC: And stuff sitting out. Like there's a big metal thing with like foil and stuff
covering the pipes and it has this big radioactive [sign], DO NOT TOUCH.
RADIOACTIVE. So I'm like, "Why is this in the hallway."
DD: Right. And on the 6th floor of Kell Hall is the food lab that belongs to the
nutrition department, that's where they do food science and grow bacteria
and nasty things, but it's also a really nice kitchen. In fact, in the first video,
Alton found that spot. I showed it to him and he loved it. And we used it to
shoot the glamour shots of the food. And then we used it to shoot the second
video on food safety. So it was great for that. But the hallways are always
dark and narrow and right next door to the food lab is where they cut up
cadavers.
MM: You just hope there's no misfiling or something. "And today we'll be
cooking up, uh, John Stevens."
[laughter]
DD: So outside the food lab, like the next lab down, there's a gurney that's
usually in the hallway. So I thought that would be fun, like she would meet
other people who would be living on campus. Because there are people who
live on campus. At any campus there are people who live here for short
periods of time. And they would have a little group and they would sneak
into the food lab to cook up things, Sunday dinners, and ... And one time
they'd come out and the gurney would have a body on it and that would be
a murder mystery.
MM: That would be a great story.
CC: That would be a wonderful story.
MM: Another one would be like a Sherlock Holmes where a little tiny tidbit of
history of some food would work its way into the mystery part, but that only
a nutritional anthropologist would know.
DD: Ahhh.
CC: Like the nightshade. That's how they got her to sleep so they could rob the
house.
DD: That's right. That's a really good idea. I like that idea. There is a story of a
woman who killed her husband with botulism that way. You know that story?
It's a good one. It's a shame she got caught. [laughing]
MM: I think of the Princess Bride where the guy builds up a resistance
to iocane
poison. You haven't seen that.
DD: No, I don't remember that. I saw it once years ago.
CC: It's a good movie.
MM: Well, thanks Ms. Duchon.
DD: Oh, thank you.
MM: And Cassie and Tina.
TE: You, too. Thank you.
