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Episode Transcript

Charlie Melcher:

Hi, I'm Charlie Melcher, Founder and Director of the Future of StoryTelling. Welcome back to the FoST podcast.

My guest today is Maureen Fan, Co-founder and CEO of nine-time Emmy award-winning interactive animation studio Baobab. With a Stanford degree, a Harvard MBA, and a resume including positions at eBay and game developer Zynga, Maureen's early career looks more like that of a tech entrepreneur than a storyteller—but her great strength is that she's both. After an early experience with VR, Maureen quickly saw the potential of the nascent medium, and, harboring a lifelong passion for animation, she left Zynga in 2015 to found Baobab with DreamWorks veteran Eric Darnell. In the years since, the studio has made a name for itself with its wildly popular VR films featuring all-star casts including the likes of Oprah Winfrey, John Legend, Daisy Ridley, and Ali Wong. Baobab's films are the closest thing to blockbusters that VR has seen, and have earned the studio the title of “the Pixar of virtual reality.” But Maureen's aspirations extend way beyond VR, and Baobab is now working on adaptations of its projects in film, streaming, books, and graphic novels.

In many ways, Baobab is not only an animation studio, but also a tech startup. They've developed their own proprietary real-time animation platform, and have utilized artificial intelligence and machine learning to develop responsive characters for their interactive narratives. It's not easy to walk the line between Hollywood and Silicon Valley, especially as an Asian female CEO in a sector dominated by white men. Maureen has done so with astonishing success and integrity, and it's my great pleasure to welcome her on to today's episode of the FoST podcast.

Maureen, it's such a pleasure and really an honor to have you on the Future of StoryTelling podcast, welcome.

Maureen Fan:

Thank you so much.

Charlie Melcher:

So I'd love to start by hearing the backstory of Baobab. How did you come up with the idea in the first place and start this amazing company?

Maureen Fan:

Oh, well, I've always loved animation, my entire life. And the reason why I love animation is because I feel like when we're five years old, we thought we could do anything, we're invincible. But something happens as we grow older and we’re pressured by society to conform to values of fame, money, beauty… But I think there's still a dreamer inside us all, and that we still can be that little kid. And that's what animation does for me. It's whenever I watch animation or I'm playing an animated game I'm taking back to that five-year-old sense of self, when I thought anything was possible. And I leave feeling so invincible that I could do anything. And I fundamentally feel that people have so much more potential than they realize. And if they just allowed themselves to dream and believe that they could do it, that they would actually go for it, and we as a species could accomplish even more.

But I wasn't going to go compete against Pixar or Disney without unfair distribution advantage or huge amounts of capital. So when VR came about, I saw it as a chance, because it's technological disruption, no one had an advantage. And I was like, “oh, I can make a name for ourselves in this brand new market because no one has an advantage,” and that's why I ultimately did. And also, animation's about putting you in a world and making it feel so real that you think you could reach out and touch it. And that's the definition of these virtual worlds that we can be in. So it was just really exciting, both from a creative aspect and also businesswise.

Last thing I just want to mention is I've realized, I didn't realize until recently, that I think one of the reasons why I loved animation so much is because I grew up in a town in New Jersey, which is the best state in the nation. I love New Jersey but I was picked on a lot because I was the only Asian American in my school. And I think I was bullied and I think I felt really insecure and trying to find my place. And I do think that animation was in a way an escape from that. And I don't think I realized that until recently when all the anti, all the Asian hate crimes started to happen, that I realized that that had a huge impact in my love for animation.

Charlie Melcher:

Wow, wow. Well I really relate to the part that you just said of discovering that inner or child and reconnecting with it through your professional life. I often say that really what I've always tried to do with my career is also rediscover the joys I had as a child. And I think a lot of people think that's the wrong thing to do. You're supposed to somehow grow out of that or those are frivolous and silly for little kids. And in fact you understand some sort of greater wisdom that comes from that inner child or that experience as you as a young girl. So you decided to start this with VR because it was sort of an open space right? Everybody had an even playing field in a way?

Maureen Fan:

Yeah. Also, it's like the mission of the company is to inspire you to dream. So what I was just saying about why I love animation, inspire you to dream, bring out your sense of wonder, make you matter. And that last sentence of make you matter is only achievable when you can actually interact, I believe, with the other characters and with the story itself. So we try to make you a character inside the audience that develops relationships with the other characters. And that means that you can actually change the storyline and you feel like you really matter in there. And VR was one of the most perfect mediums to allow that to happen because it's really important for you to bond with these characters and care about them. To make decisions and for you to truly bond with these characters, VR was a perfect medium, because it allows you to feel like you're literally there talking to a real character rather than through some kind of screen that has like you have to press buttons and think about there's more distance between you and those characters.

Charlie Melcher:

My first exposure really to Baobab was the Invasion piece that you created, which I just thought was extraordinary. And I think we featured it at FoST and partially it's because of the animation quality which was really just world class and partially because of using the medium in a way that really allowed for interactivity. It was such a mature piece. It actually stood out above almost everything else. I remember seeing at the time in VR as these were still very early days in VR. How did you create that piece? How did you create it at such a high level? Where did you come from? How'd you do that?

Maureen Fan:

Well, all the credit goes to Eric Darnell, my co-founder. So Eric Darnell, he directed DreamWorks' first-ever full-length CG animated film, Antz. And he went on to write and direct all four Madagascar films. So he is a formidable creative, and he's my co-founder and CCO. So he had decided, at this point they had shut down PDI, which was the technical arm of DreamWorks. DreamWorks actually acquired PDI to become DreamWorks Animation. They shut down the Redwood City office up in the San Francisco Bay Area and wanted Eric to move south to LA. And he's like, no, I'm not going to do that. So he was trying to figure out what he wanted to do next. And my mentor, Glenn Entis, who's a co-founder of PDI DreamWorks Animation, introduced me to Eric and I put the headset on him and he was blown away.

But he had always had this idea of when he listened to War of the Worlds or the Worlds intro about how these alien creatures were coming and how the aliens didn't realize that the Earth's atmosphere they wouldn't have done that research to know that it was an issue. And so he is like, "Well, these aliens are kind of silly." He's like, "What if I make them super silly and they're defeated by the cutest sweetest of animals," which is this cute little bunny. And so the meek of the earth are actually the ones defending it. So he's hilarious, so fun to work with him. So he came up with that idea really quickly and we just said, hey, can we do it? And we didn't know what we were doing at all. So he came up with the innovative idea of making you a bunny. So when you look down you have a bunny body and that bunny comes out at you. And so we just experimented. We did it in literally I think it was less than two months.

Charlie Melcher:

So tell me, why are you two are such good partners. What was the magic to you two getting together, you and Eric?

Maureen Fan:

So usually when directors start out they're oftentimes very insecure and it makes sense. You don't know how to direct, you're a new director and everyone's looking to you. But Eric having directed five hit feature films he is a very secure person so he has nothing to prove. That means that everything that he's doing is coming out from pure love and joy of doing it. He doesn't need, he's had a huge, great career and so now he's doing just what he enjoys. So I think that really helps honestly ground me because me as an entrepreneur can be quite insecure and frantic. I would say all entrepreneurs are kind of crazy.

And so his constant like no we're doing this for the right thing. We're doing this because of love helps ground me as an entrepreneur because my job is constantly to deal with FOMO and money and the societal values that I just like told you I want to rail against. And then he just really respects my business ability and we do our own thing yet he knows that I really love the creative part so he makes sure that I get to be a part of it. So I say we're good friends too.

Charlie Melcher:

Well so tell me about the experience of being a female CEO, a minority, trying to go raise money. I've heard that that's not exactly the image of the person who gets all the funding from Silicon Valley. So what was your experience?

Maureen Fan:

It's hard to know because you never know how much being a female and being a minority affects you. I have had very awful thoughts at times in dark moments of if being a white man would just give me 0.000001% chance more of closing this deal, then do I have a fiduciary duty to not be CEO? Because that for a startup can mean life and death. And it's horrible to have to feel that way but at the end of the day, I mean, I love this company. I built it, so I'm not leaving it, but it sucks to have to think that. And I oftentimes joke to people if I were a white man, I'd be president.

But I do know, for fundraising, that they had a study at Stanford Business School where they showed that they had the same exact pitch deck with a female voiceover versus a male voiceover with the same exact content, same exact script. The woman was, I believe, I can't remember if it's 30% or 40% less likely to get funding. So it's the same exact content and material. So you always have to wonder how that affects you.

The good thing is we were very successful in raising two rounds of funding—I guess it was fine. But when you do have failures, you sometimes wonder how that impacts you. That being said, I used it as a way to drive towards outcomes that I wanted. So for example, all the talent that we've worked with. So Oprah, John Legend, Lupita Nyong'o, Constance Wu, Diego Luna, Ellie Wong, Kate Winslet, Daisy Ridley, Jennifer Hudson. You hear the people that I just mentioned are usually women or minorities? That was on purpose. Because I feel like media has a way to transform perspectives in a way that nothing else can. And if I'm not doing it, who's going to do it?

Charlie Melcher:

So let's talk a little bit. I loved what you said before about how you do it for the right reasons, for the love of what you're making. And I think that gets lost a lot in startups. I think unfortunately particularly maybe tech ones or Silicon Valley ones. Clearly that's not the case for you all where the joy, the passion, the beauty of what you're making is at the heart of what you're doing. So first of all we should acknowledge just how well received it's been. Can you talk a little bit about some of the success that you've had for having stayed true to that vision?

Maureen Fan:

Well we're super honored by both the VR community, Hollywood and also our audience members. But we've won nine Emmys, which I'm really proud of. And we've created all of those projects in real time. And one of the reasons I'm so proud of that is because it's the first time that something that was created in real time, a real-time game engine was winning in traditional categories. Because we created both VR versions as well as 2D versions. And we also have one of the most downloaded VR experiences of all time. So Invasion has over 25 million plays. We also made the first VR to traditional media deal.

So we had announced Joe Roth of Roth Kirschenbaum Films—who did Snow White and the Huntsman, Alice in Wonderland—he wanted to partner with us to turn Invasion into a full animated film. And then we ended up striking a first look deal with Fox Disney for all of our IP to become feature films. And now our IP are also being turned into multi-series books with McMillan and Penguin Random House. And we also have several deals signed with some of the premium streamers for our IP also to become series. So we're just really excited and honored that Hollywood and traditional formats like our stories and characters so much that they see potential in all the different mediums.

Charlie Melcher:

And I just want to point out, I mean, you started in VR and in a time when honestly a lot of companies in VR are struggling, where the promise and the hopes of what VR would become have not really been realized. And I know plenty of other people who started around the same time in VR who've either closed their efforts or had to pivot very dramatically to something that just to sort of survive. You guys are thriving.

I mean you have used VR to become the basis for a true studio telling stories across media and seem to just be kind of growing and picking up momentum as opposed to what some others have been doing. So is there anything you can point to that that helps to explain why you've been able to be so successful and do all of this in a time when VR really didn't take off the way I think we all had hoped it would? And not that it won't still but it's not the get rich quick space that a lot of people thought it was going to be five years ago.

Maureen Fan:

I think we are very diligent and figure out what our differentiator was, how were going to be different from others. Also keeping the eye on the prize which is a great story is a great story. It doesn't matter what medium it's in. Like Shakespeare was a great play, great in written format, great animation like Lion King, great musicals. And we said if you have the core creative that's good you understand the technology on top of it. But if you don't have that core good story, it doesn't matter how many bells and whistles you put on it. You're putting lipstick on a pig. So you're really focused on creating really good... not that pigs are not beautiful. We want to focus on high quality stuff yeah.

Charlie Melcher:

I'm so glad you, I mean I was waiting for that answer, actually, because obviously that's so core to what we all believe at Future of Storytelling. And I do think that you've done that so beautifully. You tell amazing stories, you have incredible characters, you really get your knitting right. And you're not getting confused by it being just about tech. You put your finger right on what so beautifully differentiates you and has made you be able, when I say you I mean obviously your company, be able to thrive in this time. Tell us about your latest project.

Maureen Fan:

Namoo is created and directed by Erick Oh, and he was nominated for an Oscar this past year for Best Animated Short. He created the short called Opera. And he's a Korean American filmmaker. And he hails previously from Pixar, where he was an animator for many years. He's very talented. But his work tends to be more like poetry. And so Namoo, it's like a narrative poem come to life. And it follows a man from birth all the way to the end, and follows not only the man but also this tree which represents this man's life growing from a tiny little seed all the way through to a big tree. And Erick was inspired by the passing of his grandfather. And it was the first person he was close to that had passed away in his family.

And so he was dealing with this for 10 years, not ready to tell this story. And this story was a way for him to deal with that loss and actually explain and find meaning in life and finding meaning in his grandfather's life and talk about what the meaning of life is. And it was actually so perfect because it was done during COVID. We started before COVID, but we ended up completing it during COVID, and it was a multi-continent team even before COVID. So Korea, Germany, London, Canada, all over the place. We got the best cool artists together to create this. And given that it is about life and examining what is the meaning of each individual person's life, it's something I think that is striking chords in lots of people right now because of the pandemic, when people are thinking about what is really important. But we premiered it at Sundance earlier this year. And then we were at South by Southwest, Tribeca, all these different places. And then right now, it's still working its way through the festival circuit, but we're really proud of it.

Charlie Melcher:

It seems to me that you really try to take on new challenges with every project and push yourself and not sort of fall into something that's more formulaic which obviously would be easier. Why do you do that and what does that sort of say about where you are in your life cycle as a company?

Maureen Fan:

Well we want to constantly be innovating because the world is going to move on whether not we're going to move so quickly or not. Every project that we do has to push further on a hypothesis we have about how we make you matter. So for example with Invasion it was making you a character, eye contact, rudimentary stuff. And then the hand controllers came out for ASTEROIDS!. Then it was, okay, besides being able to look different places, how can I actually use my hands to actually impact the story? And how do you to intersect a narrative with interactivity, because sometimes when you give people control, the hand controllers, they don't want to listen to the story. They just want to bash their hands and interact. So how do you do that balance? And then Crow: The Legend was about experimenting, well, what if interactivity was more like a toy?

Like when you shake a snow globe or pop bubble wrap, it's just fun. It's not so much pressure. Like, “oh my gosh, if I don't do the right thing the story's going to end and bad things are going to happen.” And people just found that delightful… as the spirit of the season they were able to make it snow or the flowers bloom. And then the next piece, Bonfire, was super interactive. We created an AI character engine so that the other characters would react to you totally different based off of what you do. You could interact the whole time. The story would completely rearrange itself. And then Baba Yaga was even more subtle with the human interactions. And then Namoo is like, literally hand-painted, every single frame, because there's no animation interpolation. So we had to literally hand-paint every single frame and paint every single lighting scenario because it's not like Maya. So every single one of them as you see was experimenting with, “how do we make you matter? What is your role as the viewer?”

Charlie Melcher:

I just want to really take a second and make sure everyone listening has caught the difference in your mission statement which is not to make content that matters but content that makes you matter. It's just that word because I think everyone can kind of nod their head and say, oh of course you have a mission you want to make work that makes a difference in the world. And you do of course but you put that through the lens of the person who's experiencing your stories. And that subtle word just changes everything.

And I think it's fundamental to how storytelling is shifting in the 21st century. From people being passive consumers that just sit and watch or listen to being the hero in the story, being the active participant. And I think about it also how it just takes time for the people formally known as the audience to evolve too. At very first people are uncomfortable with that role or they're still learning the technology or they're learning what agency they really can have in these stories. And you are helping to bring them along as they become more experienced co-creators of the stories with you.

Maureen Fan:

Absolutely. And there's also just the research shows a lot of my venture capitalist friends are constantly showing me all this research that baby boomers in terms of what types of media they prefer, top preference is passively consuming movies or TV. And with the youngest generations, I think it was Z it's completely like that is super low. Their number one preferred medium is games and very interactive content. So this is also just going with the times. There's always going to be a place for passive because I don't always want to be super engaged and I just want to relax, I don't always want to. But given the trends of the interest and love of games, being able to have those rich worlds but your ability to interact inside them I think is a winning formula.

Charlie Melcher:

Yeah. I wonder of any other insights you have from creating these kinds of stories that empower your, I don't even know the right word. We used to say audience but that's not the word. Participants maybe now or players. I like that one references gaming and Shakespeare. But from having made successful stories that empower the participants, how you think that's evolving in terms of what kinds of stories they want to be in. I noticed also there's tremendous cultural diversity in the titles you take on. Is that intentional because you're asking a broad diversity of human beings to step into these roles?

Maureen Fan:

Absolutely. I was blown away by a lot of the research that Jeremy Bailenson at the Stanford Lab did showing experiences where if you actually go through experience as like a black woman, as someone becoming or if you're somebody becoming homeless, all these different types of people that afterwards you're more likely to have empathy and feelings towards what it's like to be different from yourself. So absolutely except in animation it's interesting because for Baba Yaga we made your name Sasha so it could be either a male name or a female name because we're like whatever it is you are. But in some of the other characters you're just an animal so it's a lot easier to do that too. And in a way you can relate to other people more if you don't bring your biases to them.

But absolutely having a diverse perspective matters in that case. We traditionally in Western cultures focus on the hero's journey. But we're really excited with Crow: The Legend to tell a different type of story and that's the indigenous world view story. Because Crow: The Legend is inspired from Native American legend. And so in Native American culture it's not about the individual it's about the community. So Sarah Eagle Heart she was CEO of Native Americans in Philanthropy who is executive producer of our project. She has the coolest name, Sarah Eagle Heart. But her and also Randy Edmonds who is a [inaudible 00:25:59] tribal elder were both voices in our production and producers. And so they told us, hey, there's a scene where you're flying in this heavens and you're flying next to some stars, a constellation, you see this constellation of a crow. And in our original version you were just like passing by and continuing on your path.

And she's like, "No, no. I want to spend more time with the constellation of the crow. I want to spend more time with mother earth, father sky, sister moon, brother wind. It's not all about Crow, it's not all about the individual. So we changed our narrative a whole bunch. Like for example just in that section we had you fly alongside Crow for a long time and go off the story path to make sure that you had enough time with the constellation. And we just thought that was really interesting and a different way of telling stories. And I know we've had like the Western three act structure hero's journey does really well but it's time for new stuff. It's exciting to be able to tap into these new types of stories and new ways of telling stories. So we are really excited about being able to do that.

Charlie Melcher:

I think a lot about why we are so stuck on the hero's journey and how much negative effect that's having on our world right now. I mean if you think about even just this ties back to that idea of the entrepreneur. The white male entrepreneur who's the hero who's supposed to single handedly go with the opportunity of his future. As you were saying the bias is on what he will accomplish. It all ties back to that hero's journey narrative. And we need all sorts of other kinds of models for how we get ourselves out of the challenges we're facing today.

Maureen Fan:

Absolutely I cannot agree more because honestly it's been confusing for me because Asian culture is about community and it's about respecting your elders and there's this like power hierarchy. And it's about being, it's a virtue to be humble. You're never supposed to say how amazing you are. And if somebody compliments your kid you don't say, “oh yeah, thanks my kid is great.” You're like, “no, your kid is great.” And this, they're supposed to go like, no, your kid, no, your kid. And I always thought this was really weird because then I'm growing up in the US, I was born here. And then I was like the majority during the daytime and then coming home to my Asian values. And they're so clashing especially in Silicon Valley where me as an entrepreneur now I can't be humble. I can be humble inside but I have to say how awesome I am.

I have to sell and it's all about me. And also just being a woman, also, it's not considered attractive for you to be like that as a woman. So then I just have to be okay with not being attractive as a woman because I'd rather be respected than liked. But it's sad that I have to make that choice. But it's just interesting, how to try to keep both values inside me, both the Asian and Western values, and trying to see how I can use it to my advantage. But it was very confusing growing up with that.

Charlie Melcher:

Yeah, that makes total sense. And what I feel a little bit is like that struggle. That conflict of cultures, that struggle between the arrogant hero and the humble community which respect your elders, work together. Those seem to me to be things that you are playing through or working out in the stories you tell. I do think that's really beautiful, powerful and part of the reason why it's so successful because your experience is more common to what many, many people in the world feel. We're a world of diverse people and you need to tell stories for everyone and not just for the hero who's taking over Silicon Valley. Our tech heroes that we seem to give way too much weight to.

Maureen Fan:

And with all the metaverse stuff coming where you are your own character in there, what responsibility do we have as creators in building these worlds that other people are a part of? But it does give you an opportunity to experiment, meet you as the player or audience with the different types of decisions you would make and try them on and see how they feel. But I do think as creators we don't want to steer you in ways that are going to hurt society.

Charlie Melcher:

Well Maureen, I can't thank you enough for being on the FoST podcast. And as I think about this conversation, I just have this sense of letting everybody be able to come and see the world through the eyes of the five-year-old Maureen and how much better the world would be as we all get to experience it with your unique perspective and those of your collaborators. And just with that sort of empowered sense of what a young girl can do in this world. So thank you.

Maureen Fan:

Thank you. Thank you.

Charlie Melcher:

A big thanks to Maureen for joining me on the podcast today. You can find links to Baobab's past work, learn more about their new piece, Namoo, and find a full transcript of today's conversation by visiting the link in this episode's description.

Thank you for listening to the FoST podcast. I hope you enjoyed it and if you did, we'd really appreciate it if you'd share with a friend or colleague who might enjoy it too. FoST also produces a monthly newsletter that's filled with valuable information for storytellers of all stripes. You can subscribe for free by visiting our website at fost.org, where you'll also find a wealth of other great resources.

The FoST podcast is produced by Melcher Media in collaboration with our talented production partner, Charts & Leisure. We'll see you again soon for another deep dive into the world of storytelling. Until then, please be safe, stay strong, and story on.