Kevin Perjurer and his team over at Defunctland regularly produce high-quality YouTube videos dedicated to themed entertainment. From doomed roller coasters to Nickelodeon hotels and even the complicated history of Disney’s Fastpass system, there’s no ride too tall for Defunctland, it seems.
We had the the privilege of speaking with Kevin Perjurer upon the release of his newest feature-length documentary, and it might be Defunctland’s biggest challenge yet: Who wrote the Disney Channel theme song? In Disney Channel’s Theme: A History Mystery, Kevin investigates the curious origins of Disney Channel’s ubiquitous theme, and as you might expect, there’s more magic to the story than a lot of people might initially assume.
The Defunctland video (for context):
Over the course of our interview, Kevin shares his influences on documentary storytelling and the driving forces of inspiration that paint his latest work. We chat about the differences between YouTube video essays and documentaries, but also what that means for artists and filmmakers finding new ways to get their work out into the world.
The interview, hosted by Jon Negroni and Cory Woodroof, is below in full, and be sure to check out Defunctland on YouTube for even more work from Kevin and his amazing team.
The intro theme music at the beginning of the show is “The First Evening,” from the composer Alexander Lasarenko on his album, Noir. The audio bumper before the interview is an archived sample of Disney Channel’s wand intro. You can find more episodes of Cinemaholics and our other podcasts here.
