Flying Waterbed. Dr. Octagon.

On 11.24.2015 Dan the Automator and I went to dinner at Lazy Bear and a few of my favorite personal projects came out of that dinner.

I was telling him how I was thinking about making a pilgrimage to Hong Kong since I have not been back since 1997 for the change over. Since I love drinking tea and kung fu and all things weird, he recommended that I check out this kung fu tea service where they practice kung fu and serve you tea out of a teapot with a long spout. Intrigued, I mentally filed it away for when I needed it.

Then pastry chef Maya Erickson sent out her Black Sesame dessert. I was first entranced by its monochomaticness and we were both extremely impressed by it after taking a bite. So much that it inspired me to make its film.

Last spring, I was doing research for this kung fu tea service that Dan was telling me about, which then led me to a rabbit hole of its origin, how it's done and where I can have it. You can say that it was prominent on my mind. Naturally, I thought I ought to make a kung fu tea hip hop music video.

On 4.20.2017, Dan opened for Banks & Steelz (RZA and Paul Banks) and I went to the show. David Lee tells me he finished his new album, so I told him we should do a kung fu tea music video for it. He told me no. I said, "Fine, I will talk to the RZA instead." Clearly, that didn't happened as we had one too many beers that night talking about movies and crashing Price Paul's party.

Which now brings me back full circle to Dan. A little bit after that Banks & Steelz show when I met up with Dan to give him this giant lollipop I made for Handsome Boy Modeling School, I told him that I wanted to do a kung fu tea music video and I was sad we had one too many beers that night with the RZA so I never got to ask him. So he asked me why don't I do it for one of the new tracks off the Dr. Octagon album. I asked him which track would be best for something like this so I can relisten to the album, and he said Flying Waterbed.

And here we are, almost a year later. My biggest thanks to Joel Knoernschild who was my only choice to direct this with me, as he loves Dr. Octagon as much as I do. Thankfully, he said yes, and we were able to pull both our heads together to make this happen. I hope you enjoy this as much as we had fun making it! And of course, none of this would have happened without Dan planting the seed of kung fu tea in my head in the first place; let me buy you some tacos!

Starring

Dan the Automator

DJ Qbert

Kool Keith

And special guest appearance

Paul Banks

Kung Fu 

Roy Chen

Director 

Joel Knoernschild

Executive Producer

Amy Yvonne Yu

Director of Photography

Randy Wedick

1st AC

Chris Schieffelin

Grip

Patrick Walsh: Little Giant Lighting

Utility/Grip

Jonathan Remple

Wardrobe Assistant 

Bridget Kaufman

Kool Keith & Paul Banks Director of Photography

Evan Pesses

Kool Keith & Paul Banks 1st AC

Adam Hamer

VFX, Colorist & Grading

Bobby Maruvada

Titles

Al Dente

Editor

Barry O Donnell

Production Assistants

Erica Steimetz

Danny Decena

Ethan Kaslow

Karen Talavera

Achinoam Morell

Kristin Pantelis

The filmmakers wish to thank

Litepanels: Hologram Camera

Mister Jiu's: Brandon Jew & Anna Chet Jew-Lee

More Media: Stephen Buchanan + Joaquin Poblete

Band Pro Film & Digital

Bulk Recordings

EVS: Toby Fulp

Special thank you

Adrian Jebef

Curtis Harris

Traci Putkey: Thud Rumble

Erik Perry: Food on the Table Artist Management

Brad Aarons + Zan Poka: New Community Management

Phil Costello + Vanessa Taub + Nick Barko + James Sandom: Red Light Management