Latest / Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews / What If the Science Points to God? Brian Bird on The Story of Everything
Transcript
- 0:02Speaker 1: Life Audio.
- 0:04Speaker 2: Hey, Brian, thanks for joining me. Thanks Michael. Great to
- 0:08Speaker 2: be with you.
- 0:09Speaker 3: Brian Bird the producer of the new documentary film The
- 0:11Speaker 3: Story of Everything. A great film and examines the scientific
- 0:14Speaker 3: evidence for a creator and includes interviews with experts who
- 0:17Speaker 3: have studied this issue, many of them their whole lives.
- 0:20Speaker 3: Steven Meyer is one of the scientists in it. Other
- 0:24Speaker 3: people of interest. Lee Strubble is an executive producer. Brian,
- 0:27Speaker 3: You've worked on projects like The Case for Christ and
- 0:31Speaker 3: one calls The Heart.
- 0:31Speaker 2: What drew you to this unique.
- 0:34Speaker 3: Film that explores the intersection of science and faith.
- 0:38Speaker 2: What drew me to this?
- 0:40Speaker 1: You know, this is my second sticking my toe into
- 0:45Speaker 1: the water, second time doing that on a documentary with
- 0:49Speaker 1: this exact same team my colleague Jason Paymer in Jen's Jacobs.
- 0:54Speaker 2: Eric, you saw the director.
- 0:56Speaker 1: I worked on the movie The Heart of Man, which
- 0:59Speaker 1: you may have seen several years ago, which was our
- 1:03Speaker 1: documentary about the prodigal son, basically and interviewing a whole
- 1:09Speaker 1: bunch of real prodigal sons and then sort of reenacting
- 1:14Speaker 1: the prodigal son's story in our own way. And we
- 1:17Speaker 1: got a lot of attention for that. And so when
- 1:20Speaker 1: we first got exposed to Steven Meyer's amazing book The
- 1:26Speaker 1: Return of the God Hypothesis, Jason Paymer and Eric and
- 1:31Speaker 1: Jens and I Know said to each other, our young
- 1:35Speaker 1: people across the world are being indoctrinated into scientific materialism,
- 1:41Speaker 1: and there's almost nothing we can do to stop it.
- 1:44Speaker 1: I mean, my own kids have gone to several of
- 1:48Speaker 1: my kids have been to college and have gone to
- 1:50Speaker 1: secular schools. They've gone to Christian schools but also to
- 1:53Speaker 1: secular schools, and there's just no stopping the freight train
- 1:57Speaker 1: of scientific materialism. If you if your young people are
- 2:01Speaker 1: going to college, it just is infused in almost every
- 2:07Speaker 1: every class they take. It's sort of the underlying worldview
- 2:11Speaker 1: for almost every class they would take in a liberal
- 2:15Speaker 1: arts school. And when we read this book, it occurred
- 2:20Speaker 1: to us suddenly that there is that there is another
- 2:23Speaker 1: way to help young people not see the world through
- 2:27Speaker 1: such bleak, bleak eyes, because honestly, when you throw yourself
- 2:34Speaker 1: into scientific materialism, there is nothing but blind, pitiless indifference
- 2:39Speaker 1: in the universe. I mean, we're looking through sort into
- 2:44Speaker 1: the abyss, into Nietzsche's abyss, and the abyss is staring
- 2:48Speaker 1: back at us and there ain't nothing there, right, It
- 2:51Speaker 1: is just a void and we are all the product
- 2:55Speaker 1: of a cosmic roll of the dice. And how can
- 2:58Speaker 1: there be any meaning to our lives? How can there
- 3:00Speaker 1: be any meaning to the universe? How can there be
- 3:03Speaker 1: any purpose to our existence? When we are a cosmic accident?
- 3:08Speaker 1: And that's what our young people are being told. You know,
- 3:12Speaker 1: no wonder, there's so much hopelessness and so much sort
- 3:15Speaker 1: of just sort of this bleak view of everything. And
- 3:19Speaker 1: when we read the Return of a God hypothesis, we
- 3:22Speaker 1: realized that there is a giant knockout punch for that,
- 3:30Speaker 1: and it's science itself. It's not Christian propaganda that has
- 3:35Speaker 1: to do that. It's not dropping the Bible on top
- 3:38Speaker 1: of people's heads. If you just follow the actual science,
- 3:42Speaker 1: it all leads to design. And that's what the Return
- 3:46Speaker 1: of a God to hypothesis that book revealed to us.
- 3:50Speaker 1: It doesn't make a case for christ, it doesn't make
- 3:53Speaker 1: a case for the Creator. It makes a case for
- 3:56Speaker 1: design in everything. And when there's design in everything, that
- 4:00Speaker 1: means it came from somewhere. And when I you know,
- 4:03Speaker 1: when I was exposed to it, I just said, guys,
- 4:06Speaker 1: this is there's a movie waiting to happen here. We
- 4:10Speaker 1: absolutely need to tell this story. And we all got together.
- 4:14Speaker 1: We went up and visited with Stephen Meyer up and
- 4:16Speaker 1: up in Seattle, and we said, let's put this together,
- 4:19Speaker 1: let's do this.
- 4:20Speaker 2: That was almost six years.
- 4:22Speaker 1: Ago that we started on this movie, and it has
- 4:26Speaker 1: taken us all this time to get it right. It's
- 4:29Speaker 1: a really tricky thing to do, you know, especially when
- 4:33Speaker 1: you're having to do it in the middle of COVID
- 4:35Speaker 1: and all of all of the challenges that we've faced
- 4:38Speaker 1: over the last several years. You know, you have to
- 4:40Speaker 1: find the money to make.
- 4:41Speaker 2: A movie like this.
- 4:42Speaker 1: It was it was pretty tricky to do, but we
- 4:44Speaker 1: didn't give up. We kept going, and this is the result,
- 4:48Speaker 1: the story of everything, and we're deeply proud of it
- 4:51Speaker 1: because the marks were getting from people who've seen it
- 4:55Speaker 1: or that it's not only a knockout punch for scientific serialism,
- 5:01Speaker 1: but it is deeply excellent. And that's what, you know,
- 5:06Speaker 1: that's what our goal is as and we are people
- 5:10Speaker 1: of faith, but we wanted to do this story in
- 5:13Speaker 1: a way that would make it bulletproof to the skeptics
- 5:16Speaker 1: and not see it as some sort of creationism in
- 5:20Speaker 1: a tuck suit, you know, which is what sometimes we
- 5:24Speaker 1: get accused of, you know, on our side of the equation.
- 5:27Speaker 1: So anyway, that's that's why I dived in, Michael, seeing
- 5:32Speaker 1: what my own kids had gone through, you know, and
- 5:35Speaker 1: going to college, and what they were sort of at
- 5:39Speaker 1: least attempted to be indoctrinated into maybe think hard and
- 5:43Speaker 1: fast about we do need to say something. And it
- 5:47Speaker 1: is a cultural moment right now. There are things happening
- 5:51Speaker 1: right now. There are young people are looking for meaning
- 5:55Speaker 1: in a bigger way than we've seen in a long time.
- 5:58Speaker 1: And I think this movie is exactly the guidebook that
- 6:03Speaker 1: they need to start that journey.
- 6:06Speaker 3: Return of the Grout how prothesis. You mentioned that that's
- 6:08Speaker 3: the book by Stephen Meyer. He's the one who is
- 6:10Speaker 3: featured prominently in this film, and that that book has
- 6:14Speaker 3: kind of the spark I guess for the movie. Yes, this, Brian,
- 6:17Speaker 3: I'm not sure if you're the one to ask this question,
- 6:19Speaker 3: and I'm going to ask it anyway. You're a producer
- 6:21Speaker 3: that this movie could have This movie could have taken
- 6:23Speaker 3: many directions, but it's unique in that there is no
- 6:25Speaker 3: narrator and it flows wonderfully.
- 6:28Speaker 2: I don't know.
- 6:29Speaker 3: What are the challenges of making a film like that
- 6:32Speaker 3: in which the experts are really the only ones you
- 6:35Speaker 3: hear from, And why did you guys choose that format.
- 6:39Speaker 1: We did the same thing on the Story of every
- 6:42Speaker 1: or on the Heart of Man, the previous documentary that
- 6:45Speaker 1: I mentioned as well. We talked to expert witnesses and
- 6:50Speaker 1: let them tell their own story. You know, documentaries are
- 6:55Speaker 1: like a lot of the other projects that I do,
- 6:57Speaker 1: which all have a script, right, all have a you know,
- 7:00Speaker 1: a script that everybody agrees to, and then you start
- 7:03Speaker 1: to film it.
- 7:04Speaker 2: With documentaries, they you know, you have.
- 7:06Speaker 1: A rough idea about what you want to do, and
- 7:09Speaker 1: the Steven Meyer's book is a incredible guide book in
- 7:14Speaker 1: terms of how to structure this filmp But we also
- 7:17Speaker 1: wanted it to We didn't want to write it first
- 7:22Speaker 1: and then let it and then try to get people
- 7:24Speaker 1: to fill that up, right, like, have an agenda and
- 7:28Speaker 1: then and then look for things that would meet our agenda.
- 7:31Speaker 1: We wanted to follow the evidence. We wanted to follow
- 7:34Speaker 1: the voices of the experts, and sometimes those interviews can
- 7:38Speaker 1: take you into different rabbit holes, say you to that
- 7:41Speaker 1: you have to pursue, and sometimes they're amazing because they
- 7:45Speaker 1: open up new possibilities that you you weren't even thinking
- 7:49Speaker 1: of when you started. So part of the reason this
- 7:51Speaker 1: movie took so long for us to do was to
- 7:54Speaker 1: get the science right, but also to find exactly how
- 7:58Speaker 1: to structure it in such a way that it would
- 8:00Speaker 1: feel accessible, that it wouldn't feel too heavy handed or
- 8:04Speaker 1: too heavy or too intellectual, but that people could have
- 8:08Speaker 1: a sense of, Okay, I can follow this because it's
- 8:12Speaker 1: being given to me in chapters really that I can follow,
- 8:17Speaker 1: and it follows sort of three big movements of science,
- 8:20Speaker 1: but we do it in such a way as that
- 8:22Speaker 1: we're exploring each of those big chapters in sort of
- 8:25Speaker 1: sub chapters along the way. And people have told us
- 8:28Speaker 1: that while that science is intense, it is also very
- 8:33Speaker 1: accessible and also very easy to understand. We have some
- 8:37Speaker 1: animations in it, We have some animetrics in it that
- 8:41Speaker 1: help to explain some of the scientific explorations that we're
- 8:46Speaker 1: doing in the movie. So we're thrilled when we hear
- 8:50Speaker 1: people say, you know what, it is heavy, but I
- 8:52Speaker 1: needed it, like I needed this, I needed this right
- 8:56Speaker 1: now in my life, And that is so encouraging to us.
- 9:00Speaker 3: Yeah, this is not one that you're going to want
- 9:02Speaker 3: to kind of side eye by looking at your phone.
- 9:05Speaker 3: You got to you gotta get on the saddle and
- 9:07Speaker 3: hold both hands on the on the on the the reins,
- 9:11Speaker 3: I guess. And why you pay attention.
- 9:14Speaker 1: It's it's engaging, It's great exactly. I mean, if people
- 9:18Speaker 1: want to get on their phones, what we would encourage
- 9:20Speaker 1: them to do is tell their friends to go see
- 9:22Speaker 1: this movie as it's coming out, you know, April thirtieth
- 9:26Speaker 1: in theaters across the country.
- 9:28Speaker 3: Yeah, it's gripping though. I enjoyed it from beginning to end.
- 9:32Speaker 3: I'm curious Brian did this making this film, did help
- 9:36Speaker 3: making this film? He did encourage your own faith personally.
- 9:39Speaker 1: One hundred percent. I started, Michael, much like you, as
- 9:43Speaker 1: a journalist, went to journalism school. I the first part
- 9:47Speaker 1: of my career was magazine and newspaper work. And you know,
- 9:51Speaker 1: I was raised in a Christian home. I did go
- 9:55Speaker 1: to church as a young person. But you can't inherit
- 9:59Speaker 1: your parents' faith. You have to embrace faith as an adult.
- 10:03Speaker 1: Right when the age of accountability or the age of understanding,
- 10:08Speaker 1: and sometimes when we go become adults that we go
- 10:12Speaker 1: on our own sort of exploration. Sometimes we go, we
- 10:17Speaker 1: can leave that faith behind. And so I was going
- 10:19Speaker 1: through secular journalism school worried about how do I hold
- 10:24Speaker 1: on to what I have been raised with? And sometimes
- 10:29Speaker 1: in life that can send you off on a wild
- 10:34Speaker 1: goose chase into another old lifestyle that you may regret
- 10:38Speaker 1: later on. And so for me, this movie has been
- 10:43Speaker 1: an incredible resetting of my own faith in the Creator,
- 10:50Speaker 1: in the worldview that I was raised with. It's incredible
- 10:54Speaker 1: what science can do. Science that you that just tells
- 10:59Speaker 1: the truth, right, you're just following the science. But what
- 11:03Speaker 1: it does is it helps you understand things that you
- 11:06Speaker 1: didn't understand or that you had doubts about. And I
- 11:09Speaker 1: will just say God is never afraid of our questions.
- 11:12Speaker 1: That's why I do believe that every young person must
- 11:16Speaker 1: ask their own questions. And as trained as a journalist,
- 11:21Speaker 1: what you do as well, you ask questions. You don't
- 11:24Speaker 1: just accept, you know on face value what you're told.
- 11:28Speaker 1: You have to dig a little bit. And this movie digs.
- 11:31Speaker 1: It does dig, and it may challenge some people in
- 11:37Speaker 1: a big way, may challenge skeptics.
- 11:39Speaker 2: Of faith in a really big way.
- 11:41Speaker 1: They're going to have to answer for themselves when they
- 11:43Speaker 1: watch this movie, because it does challenge their assumptions in
- 11:47Speaker 1: a really big way. And what I've come to understand
- 11:51Speaker 1: is that there are just all kinds of different worldviews
- 11:55Speaker 1: in the world, right, and we all lean into the
- 11:59Speaker 1: things that we that will support our worldview, right. We
- 12:04Speaker 1: rarely want to be challenged on those things. It becomes
- 12:08Speaker 1: almost our orthodoxy. And I do believe the scientific establishment
- 12:14Speaker 1: has almost a religious fervor to their orthodoxy. And as
- 12:19Speaker 1: we explained in the movie, many of the arguments that
- 12:23Speaker 1: scientists have come to make about say such as the
- 12:26Speaker 1: Big Bang, the idea that the universe absolutely had a beginning,
- 12:31Speaker 1: that there was a singularity, that there was a point
- 12:33Speaker 1: in time where something outside of space and time created
- 12:38Speaker 1: all of this, right, somehow that happened. Science points to that,
- 12:43Speaker 1: and ninety nine percent of scientists believe now in the singularity.
- 12:48Speaker 1: They believe in the Big Bang, in the creation of
- 12:51Speaker 1: this universe. So because of that, they've also had to
- 12:56Speaker 1: come up with alternate theories. Right almost it's almost the
- 13:01Speaker 1: orthodoxy of anything but God to explain how there's a
- 13:06Speaker 1: beginning to our universe because they don't want to go there.
- 13:10Speaker 1: There's so much of an orthodoxy to what they believe.
- 13:12Speaker 1: They don't want to go there. They don't want to
- 13:15Speaker 1: even admit the fact that there might be actual design
- 13:19Speaker 1: in all of us and in the universe and in
- 13:22Speaker 1: the fine tuning of our universe and in the beginning
- 13:24Speaker 1: of our universe.
- 13:26Speaker 2: They don't want to admit that.
- 13:27Speaker 1: So they look for alternative rationale. But those alternatives like
- 13:33Speaker 1: the multiverse, like quantum you know science, quantum mechanics, quantum physics,
- 13:39Speaker 1: like the simulation theory, which people talk about like we're
- 13:43Speaker 1: all living enough simulation. What that does is just kicks
- 13:46Speaker 1: the creator that back kicks the can down the road.
- 13:50Speaker 1: There still has to be a designer. There still has
- 13:53Speaker 1: to be a designer if there's if there's a multiverse,
- 13:55Speaker 1: if we're living in a multiverse, and it's our multiverse
- 13:59Speaker 1: and it's our universe that just happen to get it
- 14:01Speaker 1: right so that the life could happen in our universe.
- 14:05Speaker 1: It's the anything but God's syndrome.
- 14:07Speaker 2: And they want.
- 14:08Speaker 1: To accuse people of faith of wanting to say only
- 14:13Speaker 1: God right, right, but they say anything but God. So
- 14:16Speaker 1: there's orthodoxies competing orthodoxies, and that's what they are.
- 14:22Speaker 2: They're competing worldviews.
- 14:24Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean that the science that you have
- 14:27Speaker 1: to that you should ignore what the science is saying.
- 14:30Speaker 1: And what the science is saying is that the story
- 14:32Speaker 1: of everything is actually the story of us, That the
- 14:35Speaker 1: story of everything is us. Also because we are fearfully
- 14:40Speaker 1: and wonderfully made. When you look at us under a
- 14:44Speaker 1: microscope and you go deep, deep, deeply into the source
- 14:49Speaker 1: of our cells and our proteins and how our bodies actually.
- 14:53Speaker 2: Work, there's design and all of it. You can't deny it.
- 14:57Speaker 1: So we're not telling people, hey, open your bibles. We're
- 15:01Speaker 1: telling people look at the science and then you decide. Right,
- 15:05Speaker 1: And I think with young people who are searching for answers,
- 15:09Speaker 1: that's absolutely the best thing you could ever do is
- 15:12Speaker 1: a movie like this is hand young people a movie
- 15:15Speaker 1: like this.
- 15:25Speaker 3: Yeah, just just to kind of give folks a broad
- 15:29Speaker 3: overview of what it is. It's it's what some people
- 15:32Speaker 3: would call natural theology. And for those who want to
- 15:36Speaker 3: go from the end of the movie forward, they can
- 15:39Speaker 3: get a book by Lee Struggle or something like that. So,
- 15:41Speaker 3: and you talk about the case for Christ, but this
- 15:44Speaker 3: is more of a more of an intelligent design argument,
- 15:47Speaker 3: I guess it's kind of it's kind of what this is.
- 15:50Speaker 3: Let's briefly talk about some other projects you've been involved
- 15:52Speaker 3: in that people will be mad at if I don't
- 15:53Speaker 3: ask you. One Calls the Heart is maybe the biggest one.
- 16:00Speaker 3: Why do you I forget how many seasons? It's what's
- 16:03Speaker 3: what season you're in? You can tell us that. Why
- 16:05Speaker 3: do you think that has continued to resonate with audiences?
- 16:08Speaker 2: Brian, Well, thank you for asking.
- 16:11Speaker 1: We just wrapped season thirteen in terms of having it
- 16:16Speaker 1: air on the Hallmark Channel, and we are now prepping
- 16:21Speaker 1: season fourteen, and we're in the middle of airing our
- 16:25Speaker 1: prequel which is called eight Hope Valley eighteen seventy four,
- 16:29Speaker 1: which is sort of an origins story about how about
- 16:34Speaker 1: how when Calls the art happened in the first place.
- 16:36Speaker 1: And there's also a spinoff series called When the Hope Calls,
- 16:40Speaker 1: which is now airing season three. So I think the
- 16:46Speaker 1: secret sauce here, Michael, is when Michael and I first
- 16:50Speaker 1: gave birth to this, as you know as writers and producers.
- 16:55Speaker 1: Michael Lander Junior, I should say I sometimes speaking shorthand there,
- 17:00Speaker 1: but Michael Annon Jr. And I gave births to this
- 17:03Speaker 1: show almost coming on fifteen, you know, fifteen years ago
- 17:07Speaker 1: when it started, we were just trying to make a
- 17:10Speaker 1: show that would be kind of a legacy, kind of
- 17:13Speaker 1: a show that would have the kind of the faith
- 17:15Speaker 1: and family values that Michael's father had when he did
- 17:19Speaker 1: Little House in the Prairie and I would Heaven and
- 17:22Speaker 1: like I did when I did the show Touched by
- 17:24Speaker 1: an Angel.
- 17:25Speaker 2: In the years since the end of.
- 17:27Speaker 1: Little House in the Prairie and Touched by an Angel,
- 17:30Speaker 1: there was a whole decade or so in which everybody
- 17:34Speaker 1: went dark in terms of the content, Like it just
- 17:38Speaker 1: it was like like hope and faith and love and
- 17:42Speaker 1: all of those things on television sort of fell off
- 17:44Speaker 1: the cliff and everybody went into cynical kinds of content,
- 17:51Speaker 1: you know, crooked politicians and crystal meth dealers and zombies
- 17:55Speaker 1: and vampires. I mean, like everywhere you turn, and very
- 17:59Speaker 1: few people we're doing any kind of programming like Little
- 18:03Speaker 1: House on the Prairie or like Touched by an Angel
- 18:05Speaker 1: in that whole decade, and so when Michael and I
- 18:09Speaker 1: gave birth to When Calls the Heart, all those years ago,
- 18:13Speaker 1: we were just trying to kind of get back to
- 18:14Speaker 1: that kind of program. We didn't know if it would
- 18:17Speaker 1: be successful. We're just trying to make a good show
- 18:19Speaker 1: that reflected our values, and boy did it take off.
- 18:25Speaker 1: And it was on the Hallmark channel, which is you know,
- 18:28Speaker 1: cable television, was on a you know, it wasn't on
- 18:31Speaker 1: one of the big networks. So we didn't know if
- 18:33Speaker 1: people would even find us amid all the other noise
- 18:37Speaker 1: out there in the culture. You know, when there's a
- 18:39Speaker 1: thousand shows on television, how do you break through with
- 18:43Speaker 1: your content. There's just so much competition for people's hearts
- 18:47Speaker 1: and minds and eyeblaws, and so we didn't know if
- 18:51Speaker 1: it would be successful or not. But there was a
- 18:54Speaker 1: group of people out there that found the show and
- 18:57Speaker 1: started to fall in love with it, and they were noisy.
- 19:00Speaker 1: They called themselves Hearties. We didn't invent the Hartis. They
- 19:03Speaker 1: invented themselves. And they are trekies on steroids.
- 19:07Speaker 2: I got to tell you.
- 19:08Speaker 1: They're not wearing the tinfoil hats and all the costumes.
- 19:11Speaker 1: What they are doing is they're having community around our
- 19:15Speaker 1: show and they're making friendships. And the legacy of wind
- 19:20Speaker 1: Calls the heart will live, you know, the legacy of
- 19:23Speaker 1: the Hearties will live on Long Past Wind Calls the Heart.
- 19:27Speaker 1: Someday it will end, but I believe all of that
- 19:30Speaker 1: community that has been formed around our show, and we
- 19:34Speaker 1: believe there are about two million people who self identify
- 19:38Speaker 1: now as Hearties. It was a completely grassroots movement. We
- 19:43Speaker 1: never saw it coming, but it came right. And when
- 19:47Speaker 1: it came, we were just smart enough to start talking
- 19:50Speaker 1: back to them, like we communicated back to them, and
- 19:54Speaker 1: that sort of fueled even more growth of this fan movement.
- 19:58Speaker 1: And they are the wind beneath our wings. This show
- 20:02Speaker 1: is the top rated scripted show on Sunday nights on
- 20:06Speaker 1: cable television for several years now, and our numbers are
- 20:13Speaker 1: continuing to stay strong, even this deep into the run
- 20:18Speaker 1: of the show, which is you know, most shows begin
- 20:21Speaker 1: to fall off a little bit, but ours has stayed
- 20:23Speaker 1: very strong because people have fallen in love with Hope
- 20:26Speaker 1: Valley and the sense of community that the show brings
- 20:30Speaker 1: to them, and the redemption, the themes of redemption and
- 20:34Speaker 1: forgiveness and second chances and all of that which.
- 20:38Speaker 2: The show is rife with.
- 20:40Speaker 1: It's just what we believe, like that's what we want
- 20:43Speaker 1: to do. It's that kind of content and I think
- 20:45Speaker 1: people have sensed our authenticity about this kind of content and.
- 20:53Speaker 2: They were hungry for it.
- 20:55Speaker 1: If a whole year, a whole decade happens of cynesis
- 21:00Speaker 1: them on television and you come along with a little
- 21:03Speaker 1: show that could that has not one ounce of cynicism,
- 21:08Speaker 1: not a cynical bone in its body.
- 21:11Speaker 2: It's food.
- 21:13Speaker 1: And when you find an island full of starving people
- 21:16Speaker 1: and you bring food to them, they will love you.
- 21:20Speaker 1: It's not more complicated than that. That's the equation that
- 21:24Speaker 1: we discovered with that, and so it's very humbling to us.
- 21:27Speaker 1: It is a it is a beautiful thing to us
- 21:31Speaker 1: that we have given birth to this and that it
- 21:34Speaker 1: is continuing to stay strong and to lift people up.
- 21:39Speaker 1: It has also allowed Michael and I to get dangerous
- 21:42Speaker 1: and to do other things right. You know, we have
- 21:44Speaker 1: this beautiful sort of platform that has allowed us to
- 21:49Speaker 1: you know, move off and try new things. And so
- 21:53Speaker 1: the story of Everything is one of those things I've
- 21:55Speaker 1: been able to, you know, throw my passion into. And
- 21:59Speaker 1: there are several more of them as well that we're
- 22:02Speaker 1: working on.
- 22:03Speaker 3: This Maybe my final question for you, Brian, what determines
- 22:06Speaker 3: how long such a series goes? Is it all about ratings.
- 22:09Speaker 3: Is it all about the energy level of the cast
- 22:11Speaker 3: and crew. Is it all all those things put together?
- 22:16Speaker 2: Yes, I think it is.
- 22:18Speaker 1: All of those things put together. I think the if
- 22:20Speaker 1: the ratings stay significantly strong, you know, all the paradigms
- 22:26Speaker 1: are shifting now. So just linear channel. The Hallmark channel
- 22:32Speaker 1: is a linear broadcast channel that is an AD supported,
- 22:35Speaker 1: you know channel that just like the big networks are.
- 22:39Speaker 1: That's linear television. But now there's the streaming side of
- 22:42Speaker 1: the equation, the subscription video on demand side, which is
- 22:46Speaker 1: represented by platforms like Netflix and Amazon and and Hulu
- 22:51Speaker 1: and and and a Hallmark Plus, which is Hallmark's streaming service.
- 22:57Speaker 1: Now when shows are they're being seen on multiple platforms
- 23:03Speaker 1: all the time now, So the Nielsen ratings are only
- 23:07Speaker 1: a piece of the puzzle anymore. If you're driving subscriptions
- 23:11Speaker 1: to other platforms, that's a whole other piece of the equation.
- 23:15Speaker 2: So I do think.
- 23:16Speaker 1: That there is an evergreen quality to a show like
- 23:21Speaker 1: When Calls the Heart, it's not going to age, right,
- 23:24Speaker 1: it's already a period piece, so it's not going to
- 23:27Speaker 1: date itself, and it's We now have over one hundred
- 23:34Speaker 1: and fifty episodes of this show right, and so it's
- 23:38Speaker 1: a block of programming that I think people will continue
- 23:41Speaker 1: to watch even when we stop making original episodes. It
- 23:46Speaker 1: will be seen for generations, just like The Little House
- 23:49Speaker 1: in the Prairie is seen still today fifty years after
- 23:53Speaker 1: it was born. So I do think that we're not
- 23:57Speaker 1: slowing down. We're not nobody's talking talking about how do
- 24:01Speaker 1: we wind this up? You know, the all of our
- 24:03Speaker 1: channel has been an incredible partner and patron in this,
- 24:08Speaker 1: to the degree that we just launched a prequel that
- 24:12Speaker 1: is doing really well for them on their subscription service
- 24:16Speaker 1: that they're extremely happy with. So the storytelling universe of
- 24:22Speaker 1: Jeanette Oak and when Calls the Heart, you know, it's
- 24:25Speaker 1: not Marvel, it's not Taylor Sharedan by any means, but
- 24:29Speaker 1: it is its own little ecosystem that continues to fire
- 24:33Speaker 1: on a lot of cylinders.
- 24:34Speaker 2: And so we just are.
- 24:36Speaker 1: Our attitude is we will make this until the cows
- 24:39Speaker 1: come home, until they tell us they don't want it anymore.
- 24:44Speaker 4: If you like today's episode, please subscribe and leave a
- 24:46Speaker 4: five star review. That's how we help more people just
- 24:49Speaker 4: like you find the show. A big thanks to the
- 24:52Speaker 4: team at Life Audio for their partnership.
- 24:54Speaker 2: With us on the podcast.
- 24:56Speaker 4: If you go to lifeaudio dot com, you will find
- 24:58Speaker 4: dozens of other faith centered podcast in their network. See
- 25:02Speaker 4: you next time,