'From One Voice to Many': Indie Podcast Teases Cast Reveals in Season 3 Launch

Toronto ON, Canada—It all started with one writer, one actor, and one countdown on the Moon. Now this science fiction podcast is a Webby 2020 Honoree with 200,000 downloads.

Toronto-based theatre company Monkeyman Productions has officially announced that production is in full swing for Season 3 of Moonbase Theta, Out, with eleven new actors to be revealed as part of their freshly-launched crowdfunding campaign.

“Each season, the show has gone places I never imagined a few months before,” says D.J. Ivis, who wrote Moonbase Theta, Out especially for long-time collaborator Leeman Kessler to perform in 2018. It was a much-needed creative outlet after a stage production was cancelled part-way through production. “Two years ago, I hadn’t thought beyond twenty 5-minute episodes - then we took characters and plot points that had been throwaway references and made them vital to the story in Season 2.”

Those characters would be fleshed out and cast in 2019 - and as the cast grew, so did its diversity, with many roles for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC actors. “There was a character that was perfect for me,” says Cass McPhee, who started as a Season 2 cast member and is now a co-producer of the show. “He was trans, and spoke some French - for the first time as a voice actor, I didn’t have to pretend to be something I wasn’t. I want other marginalized actors and audience members to have that experience.”

Now the formerly one-man show has twenty eight actors on the roster for Season 3, to be paid through the show’s crowdfunding campaign which runs until August 20. Other production costs such as audio engineering and sensitivity reading will be covered by monthly Patreon supporters as well as ad revenue through the Fable and Folly podcast network. It’s a multi-faceted approach - one that clearly shows how the indie audio fiction community comes together to tell their stories.

Sylvis is up for the challenge: “Now we’re in production for Season 3, the cast and locations for the story have tripled, and we’re moving forward in ways I couldn’t have imagined without my community and collaborators.”

About Monkeyman Productions

Monkeyman Productions is Toronto’s Geekiest Media Company, founded in 2008 as a theatrical production company, and expanding into audio production in 2018. Monkeyman Productions is committed to telling stories featuring queer characters, ethnically diverse characters, disabled and neurodivergent characters, and those from other marginalized groups in strong, positive, enduring roles.