A funny thing happened on the way to the future: we’ve become increasingly enamored with the way we told stories in the past. Gen Z, the first fully “digital native” generation, is falling in love with physical media and going to the movies again.
Enter stage left SLEEPY HOLLOW, 1998: a Story Delivered to Your Mailbox.
Set in the 1990’s, with “young, hungry, ambitious computer programmer” Ichabod Crane having just moved to “Sleepy Hollow for a job for a big project working on fixing the Y2K bug,” the story unfolds as a series of “letters, sketches, and artifacts from the era of cassette tapes, flip phones, and zines.”
It’s the brainchild of Stamp Act Productions, better known to us as the creative duo of Jay Bushman and Megan Westerby, who we’ve known since the days when No Proscenium was a vague direction in our broader entertainment and tech coverage for public media. Both earned their chops in the days when transmedia storytelling was the wild west frontier of Hollywood — with Westerby helping to pioneer social media marketing and Bushman trailblazing the social media storytelling side of projects like The Lizzie Bennet Diaries.
Both have worn a lot of hats in the time since those early days of telling stories on the internet, but neither has lost their taste for telling stories in new ways that can connect with audiences in a visceral way.
Which is where the Kickstarter for Sleepy Hollow comes in.
The campaign kicked off on April 14th, and raised almost $6,600 of a $15,000 goal at the time of publication. Not bad for day one. The campaign continues through May 13th, with the experience slated to begin in August of this year.
We got more on the project from Bushman and Westerby.
(Disclosure: Jay Bushman is one of the original backers of NoPro’s own crowdfunding efforts, a long time sustaining backer, and has been our co-host on special podcast projects over the years.)
This is No Proscenium’s NOW FUNDING, a look at immersive experiences & events currently crowdfunding. To learn more about how your event could be considered for the feature check out How To Get Covered By NoPro.
NO PROSCENIUM: Tell us a little bit about this planned experience. What’s it about? What makes it immersive?
Megan Westerby: In my mind, this is immersive in that we are creating artifacts for people to hold in their hands. A bit like I’ll always visit a museum where I get to touch something, there is nothing like a story you get to experience in a tactile way. And I love the way this take on immersive makes me feel connected to the past – I’ve inherited a lot of letters sent between family members and this gives me similar feelings to going back and reading those again.
NP: What is the inspiration for your upcoming experience?
Jay Bushman: I’m always looking for ways to tell stories across multiple shapes and forms, without having a high barrier to entry. And I’ve been trying for some time to find a replacement for social media as a storytelling device, since the platforms have become so hostile. Going analog solves a lot of these problems. Also, I am always drawn to adaptations and reimaginings of classic stories. But at first I didn’t think Sleepy Hollow would be a good fit, until I sat down to read it and discovered that I’d never actually read Washington Irving’s original before; everything I knew about the Headless Horseman had been filtered through other adaptations and retellings. And I was thrilled to discover that Irving’s story is exactly the kind I love. There’s a difference between what the narrator is telling us and what Ichabod experiences. The space between those two lends itself really well to an epistolary format and opens up opportunities for a lot of fun.
NP: What do you think fans of immersive will find most interesting about this upcoming experience?
MW: What I hope fans find most rewarding about Sleepy Hollow, 1998 is the slow and gradual creation of the story through time. Pleasant waiting is part of the experience. Gives you time to daydream a bit, anticipate what’s coming next and savor that feeling. There’s something about not being able to jump forward to the end that I love – in part because I don’t always have the self-control not to spoil a story for myself.
JB: I’m hoping immersive fans will enjoy the ease of the experience. It comes to you. You don’t have to fight through traffic to drive across town, or solve intricate puzzles. (Although there are a couple of little discoveries to be made along the way.)
NP: Have you crowdfunded before? If so, is there anything different about your experience (or expectations) this time?
JB: I was peripherally involved with the crowdfunding campaign for The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, which was extremely successful. That one had the benefit of an already-existing fan base. My expectations this time are more tempered.
MW: The Kickstarter I’ve had the most experience with before now was for the video game Political Arena. That was a very different size and scale of project. I love that for this we actually have the entire story ready to go, have paid for most of the art already, and we just need the money to print and ship everything at the highest quality possible.
NP: What are some of the perks on offer for backers?
JB: The core offering is the sequence of letters, six in total arriving roughly a week apart. We also have a bundled version where they all come at once for those who prefer to binge. We also have a Collector’s Edition, where everything is printed with high-quality paper and inks; we’re working with one of the oldest letterpress printers in Los Angeles to make something really special. We’ve got a bunch of 90s themed swag - stickers and patches with elements from the story, and even a slap bracelet and branded mousepad. You can’t get more nineties than a mousepad. We’ve also got a bunch of big ticket items that pair the Collector’s Edition with unique experiences: printing classes, a visit to the International Printing Museum, and even a guided tour of the real Sleepy Hollow. Also, there’s pie.
MW: Absolutely the most well-received perk amongst people I’ve sent this to for feedback has been the Serious About Pie level. Everyone loves the stories, they get that. But us saying ‘hey, in this story there’s a diner that serves really excellent pie, so we thought we’d offer you the chance to receive a pie with the story’ was something that people really responded to.
JB: The pie also goes to a core element of our vision for this story. It’s not really a horror story, it’s more about the whimsical nature of this town and Ichabod’s attempts to make sense of it. Less Tim Burton, more Gilmore Girls.
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