Mystery Science Theater 3000's Joel Hodgson and Emily Marsh on How Marsh Became the First Woman to Host the Show

05/04/2022 02:37 pm EDT

With the launch of a new season of Mystery Science Theater 3000 later this week, the comedy institution will have a totally different look and feel. Launching on the Gizmoplex, a new app created specifically for the new season of Mystery Science Theater 3000, the cult classic series will now be a subscription platform, with fans getting unlimited access to all of history's MST3K, as all as an exclusive platform for the new episodes coming beginning this weekend. Another big change? Bot only will Joel Hodgson, the series' creator and original host, reprise his role as Joel Robinson, but Emily Marsh will join the cast as the TV series' first-ever female host.

That's doubly interesting about Marsh's introduction, is that she wasn't famous going in. That was true with all of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 veterans, who started the show when it was on public access in Minnesota...but when the show moved to Netflix a few years back, they brought on Nerdist's Jonah Ray, as well as geek culture icons Patton Oswalt and Felicia Day. Marsh, comparatively, feels like a bit of a question mark to new fans.

"That is 100% correct, and I do love that," Marsh told ComicBook.com. "I think most of the time they were like, 'So who are you?' And I'm like, 'I'm literally no one.' I feel like I was plucked from the street. Actually, I loved in a meet and greet. Somebody said ... I love they were very direct. They went, 'Who did you know, to get where you are?' And I was like, 'I knew no one.' The only reason I'm here is because of a little thing called auditions in New York City because MST3K Live. It was the only time I think, Joel, that you guys had auditions for an MST3K property. And so I was one of, probably couple hundred people who came to audition. And like I've said in some other interviews, I totally credit the fact that I auditioned, I did my thing, but seeing the guy that I watched growing up behind the table. And I decided to share that this Mystery Science Theater is very beloved in my house except by one person, which is my mother and who I definitely shared with Joel in that audition room, that I was like, yeah, her response to me auditioning for this was, 'How did that stupid show get a national tour?'"

"And that made me like Emily right away, that it's almost like...the need to share something funny went beyond how it would affect her professionally," Hodgson added. "I thought that was very endearing. You know, that's commercial suicide to tell me that your mom hates my show. You're hired!"

Marsh joked that when she was touring with Hodgson for MST3K Live, he would sometimes point out the fact that other producers might not have taken that so well. She told us that she would reply, "Well, then I probably wouldn't have been the right fit for the show, if that first pass at humor hadn't gone over well."

Hodgson added that there was more than just a good first impression that led to Marsh hosting the show.

"Emily is a puppeteer, and came in as a puppeteer," Hodgson told ComicBook.com. "We hired her as a puppeteer, but I also started to think about her as a potential host. And so we started to kind of work on talk about moving her into that. I think she does think like a puppeteer, and that's really important in this context. Because the one thing I like about puppeteers so much is, they work together so well. Like when you're behind the scenes at a puppet show, and you see what they're doing, it's this perfect collaboration that people will never see or ever appreciate, because what they're putting forward is what's above the puppet stage.
I think Emily gets that, and that's really how you have to approach it. You really are one of an ensemble and people want to kind of say, 'Well, that's the host,' or, 'That's the star,' but we know that's not true because the other performers are so essential and so important to it. Part of Emily's superpower is, she can collaborate, and knows that it's the group kind of moving forward as one, rather than her having to go out there by herself. If you had to do it, you got this cadre of really funny people around you almost all the time. So I think that is useful and helpful when you got to do this kind of stuff."

Which is ironic, given that Marsh said part of the charm of MST3K is that the characters developed on the show were so fully rendered that, over the years, she often did not think of them as puppets at all.

"People have asked me, they're like, 'Did you go into puppeteering because of Mystery Science Theater?' And I went, 'Honestly, I never thought of them as puppets.'" Marsh said. "It's almost like a consequence of having puppets that are so lifelike and human. You're like, 'Oh yeah, they can pick something up. Oh yeah. Have Crow pick up Tom and then paint his nails and then spin around. What do you mean they can't do that?...Oh right! Because they have sticks up their butts, and somebody's beneath the desk having to make all that happen.' It's sort of like the consequence of making such a memorable and lifelike character of Tom and Crow that you don't think of them as puppets and you kind of forget their limitations."

The Gizmoplex will be the only place to see new episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000, and will kick off with a weekend of premiere screenings: Santo in The Treasure of Dracula (May 6), Robot Wars (May 7), and Beyond Atlantis (May 8). After that, the Gizmoplex will release brand-new MST3K content every two weeks, including new episodes and shorts, as well as livestream premieres and special events.

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