Five Questions with Dangerworks
Ever wonder what the DangerWorks origin story is? Hint, it involves Corey Tatarczuk. What about how the famous Shitty Rigs Instagram account started or its subsequent podcast, Wrap Drinks? Well, those stories involve bad lighting and the pandemic. So shake up a cocktail or mocktail and read on – Michael Melamedoff kicks off the 2025 season of his Five Questions series with DangerWorks co-founders and Cowboy Bear Ninja family, Mike Farino and Jonathan Argudo!
This interview has been condensed for length and clarity.
MIKE FARINO: It's official.
MICHAEL MELAMEDOFF: We're here, we're making it happen. Talking today with two of my all-time favorite collaborators, incredible producers slash shooters slash jacks-of-all-trades slash podcasters: Mike Farino and Jonathan Argudo, who collectively make up the company DangerWorks. Guys, I'm thrilled to see you. There was a time when I felt like I couldn't step onto a Cowboy Bear Ninja set without seeing one of you or both of you making magic for us. I mean, you were on all of our first television shows, you were on so many of our commercial sets. Can you tell me a little bit about what you're doing now under the guise of your incredible company, DangerWorks?
MIKE FARINO: So we started as a small shop production, and then we had a moment where we could pivot into a larger format. And now we have a couple of studios. We are mainly focused on branded content and sort of like this doc-lifestyle niche, and that's helped us grow this company into a 6,000 square foot studio. It's kind of wild. It was a dream of both of ours when we first started. And now it's a reality. John and I both have a bit of ADHD and OCD, so we're constantly kind of going back and forth from different projects. And I feel like we're always looking for a new creative thing. And right now we're kind of pushing more into series-based content and feature films.
MELAMEDOFF: It sounds like restlessness is sort of your superpower, as it were.
JONATHAN ARGUDO: Yeah.
FARINO: [laughs] Yea. We thrive on the chaos.
ARGUDO: We're very hands on, too. Even when we're just facilitating a job as a producer, there's always a moment when there's something that we can physically get involved in. I think it's because we have always felt like we need to know enough to work with smaller crews. I think that is the other thing that Mike and I have always been really good at – finding a really efficient way to have the necessary crew members on a job. It allows us to do the job well, and also surround ourselves with creatives that are not only good at their jobs, but we like hanging out with them throughout the day. So it makes the set feel a little bit more collaborative in that way.
MELAMEDOFF: Like I mentioned, I can't remember being on a single early days Cowboy Bear Ninja set and not seeing the two of you around. And I think at Cowboy, we always feel like our frequent collaborators are part of an extended family. I know a lot of production shops say that, but we mean it. Even now that you have your own company, we feel like you’re sister company. And to that end, I'm curious: How'd you guys come into the family? What's the origin story? How did we get so lucky to get to work with you?
FARINO: Corey is the reason that John and I met. In typical Corey fashion, she was like, Mike, you need to meet Jon Argudo. Jon Argudo, meet Mike. You're both the best! And then walked away. I guess that was the origin of how DangerWorks came to be, because she kind of just jammed us together. It was like, you two are perfect. And, boom.
ARGUDO: Yeah, that's exactly how I remember that. I had known Corey a long time from my days doing video editing work for the New York Parks Department. I had gotten the job which started as an afterschool internship thing in high school, then my teacher introduced me to Corey. Eventually I remember meeting Miguel – I was going from PAing to doing AC work on some of your jobs. Cowboy was doing a lot of nonprofit work at the time, and it was the same kind of deal – small crew, everyone had a designated job, but the expectation was that you could kind of float a little bit and maybe take on a little more. So it just feels like, like you said, we're a sister company. A little bit of filling in certain pockets or roles that you guys need help on for certain things.
MELAMEDOFF: How long have you guys been collectively Dangerworks together now?
ARGUDO: 2013?
FARINO: Yeah, 2013. I think there was like a year or two before that, but yeah.
ARGUDO: Our first office was literally the back of a room with a false door in like an illegal studio in a basement. Now we have ground floor load-in, a parking lot, two huge studios with windows. We didn't even have a window in our first studio!
MELAMEDOFF: Cowboy started at a similar time in 2011, so we've all obviously seen a really big evolution in the kinds of content that we're working on and the stories that we're telling. What has that journey been like for the two of you in terms of spreading into new spaces and tackling different kinds of stories?
FARINO: I would say it's been challenging as of recent, just because social media has really changed the landscape of what stories are hitting and where the content is going. We used to do a ton of work for NowThis, Thrillist, Vox, Vice, and now those stories have moved into just someone filming it on their phone. So it's interesting because longer form content is impactful because it really gets to explain the problem versus just being this highlighted clip that is out of context. But I feel like there's not a distinct outlet for it [long form] anymore. You know? It's a little scatter shot.
ARGUDO: It also forces you to rethink how your skills can fit into this new sort of medium, right? Because ultimately that's what social media is – it's just a new sort of medium or distribution channel. But then the expectation is that it's only for the web so it only needs to be one person which is not true depending on the scope of what the content is or how it needs to be shot, et cetera. But it also makes you rethink how much of myself can I actually put into this role or this job before it feels like I'm doing too much for not enough compensation, right? Because that's the last thing you wanna do too is undervalue what you have to bring to the table or undersell your company in a way that undervalues everyone’s work. So I think that's been a challenge, too – fighting that sort of general filmmaker anxiety of like, did I pick the right career? Is it too late to be a doctor or a plumber?
[They all laugh.]
MELAMEDOFF: I ask myself all the time if it isn't too late to go be somebody's shrink, because I think I’d been really, really good at it.
[They all laugh.]
MELAMEDOFF: That being said, you are both involved in what I'd almost call them public art projects. They really speak to the filmmaking community and to the challenges and ingenuity of the community. I want to talk a little bit about them both because they're two projects that I love. The first is Shitty Rigs. Can you tell us a little bit about what Shitty Rigs is?
FARINO: So Shitty Rigs actually came about in large part from that movie that we did with Miguel way down in Florida. So we started that in like 2010 or 2011? It was a Tumblr, if you can remember those days. And it just came from always seeing on Facebook these impressive looking setups to get a shot. I was at that time just doing nonstop indies. So I was like, yeah, anyone can make anything look great if you have like 12 to 18 K’s and condors – anything can look great like that. We never had any of that, so we would always patchwork something together to get close to that same final output.
I remember there was a job – it was like an AirWick commercial? And it was right at that time when cameras had like a low ISO and then they went to this 800 base ISO and no one was really prepared for it. I was shooting in a studio in Manhattan that was absolute garbage – all of the overhead lights were basically on or off. There was no dim. There was no designation to selectively turn them off, either. So the DP was like, we gotta keep them all on, so we just gotta cut them. And I just kept throwing things in this 20 by 20 net above the set. I'm talking like full sheets of foam core, everything I could throw up there to just cut the light down without having to turn the lights off. And eventually he was like, it looks great. When I heard him say that I'm on a ladder with my buddy Bert who also helped start this thing. And we're looking down at just like this garbage bag of things. It was absolute shit. We were like, this is the shittiest rig ever. But the reason they're shitty and the reason we say this rig is shitty, is because everything that you're doing to get the shot is shitty, but the results that you're getting are great. When you're seeing BTS of big Hollywood movies, the behind the scenes looks impressive and immaculate and awesome. Our version of that is a behind the scenes that looks like a dumpster fire, but the results are really good.
MELAMEDOFF: I have very fond memories of you lighting our first ever game show pilot for like five bucks – figuring out a way to make that work with almost no lights on a grid and being super grateful for the work that you did. That's the reality. If the product looks good, the product looks good, and the audience doesn't know. I always think about the fact that at the end of the day, your audience doesn't know whether what they're watching costs 10 billion dollars or 10 hundred dollars. They just know whether they like it or not. So the only thing that matters other than running a good set and keeping people safe is actually telling the story the right way.
FARINO: I think that with technology, it's gotten even more ingrained in every department now – camera, lighting, everything. Things are getting smaller, lighter, brighter, and you can really get away with a lot more now than you used to be able to. And I think that actually has pushed Shitty Rigs even higher up now, because now… Not that it's a good thing, but you do not need all of those lights, those stands, those cables. You can really get creative with where you're placing things.
MELAMEDOFF: That's awesome. And where does Shitty Rigs continue to exist now for people finding this on their iPhones or reading this on our blog?
ARGUDO: Well Shitty Rigs continues with its visual posts – all the photos that get submitted are on Instagram. But we started creating content with the podcast that also lives on YouTube and TikTok. But if you have a shitty rig that you want to submit, you can DM the Shitty Rigs account and we’ll do our best to get to it because it's currently backlogged. It's insane the amount of stuff that goes on on sets at all tiers of production. I think that's the misnomer – people think that this stuff only goes on on low-budget projects. But you know, sometimes you might see a shitty rig on a well-budgeted film. It just so happens that whatever it was that the director or, you know, the gaffer asked for at that moment, the crew didn't have, and they just had to make it work.
MELAMEDOFF: I always say all of the pre-production that we do is for the inevitability that something is going to go wrong and then you've got to solve a problem, right? I can't remember a single day on set where for all of our planning, something didn't go sideways and the real magic of producing and making is figuring out how to fix it. To that end, you guys do have a podcast now that's part of the Shitty Rigs world, right? It's called Wrap Drinks. I love this project and this incredible collection of filmmaking stories that you guys have assembled. Can you tell me a little bit about the podcast and where we can find it?
FARINO: The podcast is on anywhere you can listen to a podcast, thanks to Spotify. It's also on YouTube if you want to watch it in a video form. It started during the pandemic when we were trying to figure out new ways to keep Shitty Rigs going and broaden it a bit more. We were missing that thing that after you’ve wrapped a shoot, you go to a bar and have a drink and decompress before going home. So that's kind of the idea of Wrap Drinks – let's all just get together in this kind of loosely structured space, have a drink, and then just talk out things: careers, crazy stories, war stories that we've had on set. From there, we can give knowledge to younger generations or even just help someone. Just another way of sharing ideas. Because ultimately that's what Shitty Rigs is, right? It's just like, I had this problem and I solved it like this.
MELAMEDOFF: Last question. With all these years of doing Shitty Rigs on Instagram and Tumblr, and now doing the podcast over the last few years, have there been any takeaways? Have there been any conversations or any discoveries for you that have changed the way that you think about making film and video?
ARGUDO: I think that at least from the comments we get on our reels, and even some of the stories that we hear from our guests on the show, is that there is this overall love for film but it’s a difficult love that they have with the way things are run. I'm finding more that people really want to have conversations about how we can make this lifestyle a little less abusive and a little less stressful for everyone. Because unfortunately, it feels like usually the people that get to dictate the most-funded or well-produced jobs don't always have the crew's best interests in mind. Our podcasts have created a space, I think, for people to kind of vent and share those stories and kind of help us remember why we do this crazy thing. But it also allows industry creatives who aren't in front of the camera or who don't get to go to the Oscars have a little bit of a spotlight. People can be doing this for anywhere between 10 to 40 years and you might not ever hear their name. But everyone that works with them locally can tell you stories about them, and how brilliant they are and how fun they are to have around. You'd be surprised who knows who too. The industry feels big, but at the same time it feels very small. That's been resonating with me a lot in terms of what we've been seeing in comments and engagement.
FARINO: Yeah, I feel like from my point of view, the reason why I like Wrap Drinks so much and the reason why we've continued to do it is I get to see what other departments deal with. Departments that I've never really been involved in or understood how they operate, like costume and wardrobe and makeup. It's interesting to see things from their perspective. And you realize that when you boil it down, every department and every person on set is dealing with very similar problems. Most of the time we're fighting each other on set for more time or for more of something, you know? But in reality, when you start to look at it from everyone's point of view, you can start to operate differently because you now see each other’s why. To be able to see production from everyone else's perspective has really helped me. And I hope other people who listen or watch have gained appreciation for other departments, too.
MELAMEDOFF: I think a good note to close this conversation on is to say that it's an important time to remember that there's both strength in numbers and strength in empathy. I'm really glad that we get to count you both as part of our extended family. So guys, thanks for the chat today and excited to listen to the next episode of Wrap Drinks.
ARGUDO: Thanks, man. Appreciate you making the time to chat with us.
