Posted in: Dungeons & Dragons, Games, Interview, Tabletop, Wizards of the Coast | Tagged: Becca Scott, Curious Hedgehog, d&d, Dungeons & Dragons: The Twenty-Sided Tavern

Interview: Becca Scott Talks Twenty-Sided Tavern, Parlor Room, & More

We chatted with Becca Scott, who will be joining the Dungeons & Dragons liveshow Twenty-Sided Tavern, for a few dates starting Thuesday

Recently, the crew behind Dungeons & Dragons: The Twenty-Sided Tavern revealed the guests they would have perform with them during their last run of shows in New York City before they take the show on tour. The last guest to take the stage will be Becca Scott, formerly of Geek & Sundry, who is now working on multiple projects at once. Including her own show, Good Time Society, as well as the recently launched show Parlor Room, currently running on Dropout. Scott's run with the liveplay theater show will run from April 24-29 at Stage 42 in Manhattan, but before that, she sat down with us for a quick interview about her run and other projects she's been working on.

BC: How did you first hear about Twenty-Sided Tavern? Was it word of mouth, or did you go check out a show?

BS: I'm just popping open Instagram like normal, I see Erica Ishii posts, and I say, "Oh my God, what is this? It looks so cool." I watched the clips and then a Aabria [Iyengar] is out there, and then Ify [Nwadiwe] is out there. Then I talk to our good friend from back in the Geek & Sunday days, Sax [Carr], and he asked me if I wanted to come out. We talked back in February, and I was like, "I don't know. I got so much going on. I'm running a Kickstarter, blah blah blah," and it just perfectly worked out that I luckily get to be the last guest before tour.

Nice! Have you seen a full show yet through any livestreams or videos sent to you?

I did get to see a performance just so I know what's going on. A lot of the performers get to watch one live beforehand. My travel schedule is such that I will not; going on a little vacation right before. So, I'm just gonna jump right into rehearsal and then the deep end!

Do you already have a character that you've worked on that you're planning for the show? Or is this more of a thing where you dive in and improvise as you go?

There are characters, and what is so great about Twenty-Sided Tavern is that it has this structure to play within that guarantees every audience gets a good show. But then the improvisational aspect guarantees that every audience gets a completely unique show. So there are three performers on stage. Well, five, one is a dungeon master, and one is the tavern master who does more of the app interaction with the audience elements. Then the three performers there are the three potential tracks. There's this Spellcaster, the Warrior, and the Trickster. So I will be playing the Warrior, which is not a specific class in D&D, but within that I'll be preparing three different characters that are character sheets that have already been created by Twenty-Sided Tavern. Other audiences have seen these exact characters played by different performers so of course it won't be exactly the same because I'm gonna bring some Becca to it.

Is there any prep work that you're doing ahead of time aside from that work to get yourself ready to be on stage and perform multiple nights?

The improv aspects I am so ready for! The structural elements, I'll be studying up on up until the first performance. Because there is a sort of branching pathway, a choose-your-own-adventure style of where the story structure can go. There is some memorization of just the character introductions because those are very important to lay the groundwork of this fantastically hilarious characters that have already been created that have very strong character bits, and I'm excited to make my own.

When they go out on tour, would you like to be a part of that? Or will you do the New York City residency and call it good?

I am definitely interested, especially when they're in LA. But then again, they have so many contacts out here from our actual play, and Dropout, and the Critical Role community, that they won't have a hard time finding performers. But with a little one at home, it is a little more difficult to travel for work. So, the beautiful thing about this performance is I'm bringing my family to New York with me, and they're gonna have a great time hanging out in New York while I am doing the show.

I was gonna ask a little bit about it later, but while we're on the topic, how's motherhood treating you?

I absolutely love it. It definitely changes the way I prioritize my time and how much organizing my Magic cards I get to do. But it makes me really be able to put the phone down and turn off when I'm not at work and to really go hard and make sure I'm doing absolutely everything. I can in the hours where I am at work.

Are you at the level of like teaching them how to play small preschool games and stuff like that? Or is it still at the building block/education level kind of stuff right now?

She's about to turn two, so she's just starting to show imagination. So you know, she doesn't understand that we're tabletop role-playing, but I do when we reenact Moana. She says, "You Maui, me Moana!" just over and over, that's the level. But there are some really cool introductory games for like three, four, and five-year-olds that I'm eyeing and will definitely be teaching her as soon as she shows an interest in that kind of thing.

Very cool! Outside of the upcoming shows, you've got Good Time Society. You just ran a Kickstarter for the Blood on the Clock Tower shows. Can you talk a little to that and your excitement over bringing that back?

I am so incredibly excited. This was the first time I've run a Kickstarter that I threw all my weight behind and I said, "This is Becca's Kickstarter! I'm not helping out with somebody else's. This is mine! This is Good Time Society. Let's go!!!" I was so floored by the response. We're gonna do an eight-episode season, which I was like, "If we only do two episodes because that's what we raise, then that's cool and maybe we'll prove ourselved and people will want more."  I am really excited because we're gonna be able to hopefully make all of my dreams come true, production-wise. We have a new studio space that is a lot more square footage than the pilots that we shot and I can't wait to make them absolutely creepy and watch the fun shenanigans come out of that and be in a completely immersive set environment. Because I think it really changes the performances you get and really changes the way that people dig in. Not that they didn't in the test episodes we shot, but I've never I've never been more excited to be at the helm of such a cool project except maybe for Parlor Room.

Yeah, it seems like you've got a full plate going on, now with Parlor Room out now. How did that come about, and what was it like working with the Dropout crew to make it happen?

Dropout is a dream to work for. They're so supportive. They have really great resources, and they're really ready to share and to treat everyone with respect and pay everybody well! I am so honored that I got to be around and got to be a guest on a lot of other shows. Then when they were thinking about doing a board game show, they asked me to create a pitch document. I did that, and then it all sort of organically just came together. One day I woke up and I was like, "Wait am I doing my absolute dream show right now? Yeah. Yeah, I think I am!" I have this incredible team, I say "Hey, what if the set was like a creepy Alice in Wonderland-like melting parlor room made of jewel tones?" And they're like, "Oh, you mean this?" So it feels phenomenal to just have the support that I had from Dropout. It's really, really cool.

Is there anything else that you've been working on or stuff that you're excited to see and do in the near future?

Everything! Now! Good Time Society is always up to functioning again, we've always got new little actual-plays or board game stuff coming out. Keeping a secret about Twenty-Sided Tavern and also Parlor Room, and also my Kickstarter. I really can't keep a secret. I talk about it on my gaming morning show all the time! But those are my three gigantic plates that I'm happily spinning, and luckily, Parlor Room is completely filmed, so now, I just get to enjoy people reacting to it. But yeah, I'm really excited for the debut and just see what else comes next.

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