Michael Rand (M) and Keith Richotte (K) produce the "Purple Funk" program on MTN. The Monitor team caught up with them in the Venus edit suite. Tell me about your show M: I'd say our show is a combination of many things… K: It's sort of a sports theme with performance art and a little bit of Barbara Streisandish torture films. M: It's really an avant garde thing. It's primarily about sports… K: But even more so about life and love. M: I think in the end it ultimately comes down to a comic vehicle for our respective talents, but it's mostly about sports. Could you tell me about the evolution of your show? M: We got into the business here at MTN with a single project, which was a movie that Keith wanted to make… K: Which by the way is real crappy. M: Yeah, and in an effort to stay sharp we wanted to do a TV series. We bounced a couple of ideas off each other. One was a homework help show where we'd accept calls from grade schoolers, high schoolers and respond to their homework queries. The other was a cooking show but neither one of knows how to cook that well, so a sports talk show kind of became the theme because we were well-versed in that. Would you like to expand on that? K: In the last three years "Purple Funk" has evolved further. We have another co-host so now there's another talking idiot on the show, and we actually use words for those viewers of ours who can't read, so we're real happy about that M: I guess the most dramatic technological advances have involved the use of an audio mixer, which was huge, and also the giant leap from the 460 camera technology to the 456. W hat advice do you have for folks who are trying to develop a public access series? M: Have an idea and be persistent with it; don't give up. With the exception of the last five weeks I don't think we've missed that many shows. So I think you have to make it a priority. It doesn't have to consume you; you don't have to spend a lot of time in preproduction… K: Lord knows we don't. M: God knows we don't, but just make sure you're cranking out some kind of project, no matter how thrown together it is K: This is the difference between our show and several other shows out there. Most shows are trying to find an audience and entertain them, whereas our show is more about entertaining us, the hosts of the show. I think that if you have fun with it and try to entertain yourself you'll have a successful show that's boffo in the ratings. M: And if you don't end up entertaining other people in the process that's okay because at least you're happy. Any thing else you'd like to add? M: The official three year anniversary of the show is September 24. On that date in 1999 we showed our first episode ever.  You might have watched it, but you probably didn't hear it because we got a note back from MTN saying that the audio was very poor and indeed it was. So maybe we should preface that and say that the first audible "Purple Funk" showed on October 1, 1999. I would just like to thank all the folks who called or sent e-mails to support us over the years and also say that we plan to be on for many more years to come. K: I'd also just like to say two things in closing: number one, we are looking for an intern (if you want to apply please contact us; the e-mail address is on the show), and secondly, I do very much enjoy tacos. Purple Funk is shown on Fridays at 7 p.m. on MTN Channel 17.