Kings of Con is More Important Than You Can Imagine
Do you remember that moment in life when you thought you could do anything? Maybe your parents told you that you could be whoever you wanted to be when you grew up when you were just a wee thing. Maybe you were seventeen and considering getting a tattoo or a piercing, just embracing the freedom of driving and being on your own. Perhaps you were in your twenties and had that epiphany of “I could do whatever I want. I could go herd llamas in Tibet! I could learn paddle-board Yoga!”Perhaps you were forty and realized you could in fact tell your boss to “take this job and shove it.”
Do you remember what stopped you? That moment when the sky was no longer the limit? The glass ceiling stopped you. Someone limited your imagination. You decided you weren’t enough. You decided that there was some middle ground you had to settle for. I remember what stopped me. It stopped me from writing for ten years. On the inside, way down deep, I think we all still want to believe in magic and we all want to know that hitting a brick wall doesn’t mean it’s game over.
Somewhere along the way, no one told Rob Benedict and Richard Speight Jr that magic isn’t real and the impossible isn’t actually possible. If anyone told them, I don’t think these two men heard the message over the sound of their own awesome and the positive feedback loop they’ve created.
When Rob and Rich came up with the idea for Kings of Con they turned to crowdfunding to make it happen. As the guys said, they had the crowd, and the fun. All they needed was the “ding.” “Ding bringers” lined up quickly to start funding this venture. The magic started coming in. People like me, though…we’re pessimists. Looking at the timing of their reveal (they revealed Kings of Con at about the same time as Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk came out with ConMan) and the impossibility of the situation, I remember thinking “That’s such a cool idea and I would watch the fuck out of that show…too bad it’s not going to happen.”
Instead of sitting back and getting mopey and looking at the ConMan fundraiser in despair, Rob and Rich rallied. They continued to crowdfund and got all they needed and more. They kept moving forward, started writing, pitching the idea, filming the pilot…they did all sorts of crazy things that leave normal people going “You can do something like that? Like…no one stopped you?”
Make no mistake, I don’t think Rob and Rich are actually superheros (though I haven’t seen them in the same room as any of the Avengers so…) but I do think they have this drive that all great artists have. They have a passion for what they believe in. Lucky for us, these weirdos believe in bringing life and laughter to everyone. They believe in creating content and having a good time. They believe in laughing at themselves.
I could sit here and talk about the two episodes of Kings of Con for one-thousand more words. The episodes were wonderful. Kings of CONversation was a wild adventure. The whole point of this is the following:
Rob and Rich willed this production into existence. They worked hard and just kept creating no matter how weird the whole thing seemed. They picked a goal, pointed themselves in the right direction, and just made it happen.
If Kings of Con can exist and be well received what’s stopping the rest of us? Someone out there has a piece of art locked inside of them. You have a book, a painting, a song, a photograph, trapped inside your soul. Do me (and yourself) a solid, take a look at Rob and Rich. Think about the process they went through. They had the idea, found the funding, and enlisted friends in making their vision a reality.
The best tribute I can think of to two men who have given their hearts and souls (and continue to do so) on the con circuit is to give our hearts and souls to our art. Keep writing, singing, dancing, painting, creating. Keep going. Take a piece of your heart, toss it into your art and let no one stop you.
