John’s Top Ten 30MOM Skits

By John Ryan. | February 5, 2024


When asked to do my Top Ten, I realize it may not be as much of a thoughtful thing for me to do as it is for Jerry or Joe. I could almost guess what those guys would have guessed with a few surprises. I do not have as much of a stake in 30 Minutes of Madness being in my life, yet it has had a way of being part of my identity. When doing this I tried to section off myself into two halves; one half is the person I am now in 2024, and the other is the person I was when 30 Minutes of Madness most excited me——well I shouldn’t say that, but I did——I should say when 30 Minutes of Madness was a pure and innocent endeavor, when I thought we would change the world. “Well what year was that,” you might ask, and I might say “Um, 1993 or 4ish”, so myself in 1994, with a videotape in my backpack with episodes 6, 7, and 8, smoking a joint on Eric Lovell’s couch and watching PCP Robot at 3am. The things that I really got into are what makes up half of this list, and some things that I never would have thought possible were the newer skits that made it. So, enjoy my Top Ten——maybe there will be at least one skit that made it to my list that aren’t in the other’s, and if you are reading this, that makes you officially a 30MOM head, which in 2024 is probably an okay thing to be. Enjoy!

#10

A Day in the Life of John Ryan

I love this skit because it was so freakin’ spontaneous, and although I am the main character in this skit, I just pretty much listened to Joe and what he wanted. I forget why I ended up with Joe on acid at The Rocks with my drum machine in the back of my car, the Sequential Circuits DrumTraks, which was our only prop—and no we didn’t hang out with grade school kids that smoke cigarettes, they were just there at the rocks and Joe wanted them in the skit. I honestly didn’t know why he wanted them in the skit, and I didn’t think it would be good, I thought it would suck, but the little kids made it awesome, and I think we might have used a different camera than normal, but not sure, the sun is setting, I think I like the color of the woods. Shot on Tuesday, November 15th, 1994.
Appeared on episode 12.

#9

How Much?

This is one of my favorite 30MOM skits. It’s short and sweet, and I have already talked about having been obsessed with PCP, and the PCP Robot ended up obsessing others on its own, Shane too.
From the LF Vault.

#8

Suburban Legend

This was another magical skit done the summer of 20 Years of Madness, the doc. The location may not even be there anymore——that’s what I was told, The Rocks. There were quite a few skits done there, I am pretty sure all things that I was a part of. The Rocks was an old place where I used to go smoke weed when I was a teen in Lake Orion. I am pretty sure I introduced it to everyone. I thought the acting was pretty good, I was proud of myself, it’s not like typecast, John Ryan stuff. Jesus and my character, I forget if we had names, were pretty much a serial murderer team that lures people out to the rocks that are into exploring the rocks, due to their own murderers but pose as experts to the area as Jerry’s character was a British goth exploring the rocks where other murders had happened.
Appeared on episode 15.

#7

Razzmatazz

I enjoyed making this, everyone contributed. Lucian’s performance was amazing, as well as the flashback sequence with a younger Anton, as Jesus Rivera and his coke-head friends Nai Sammon and Simone Else. I enjoyed trying to do a more normal role, my big contribution was coming up with my character Leo’s problem, which was a condition that caused him to vomit every time he is touched by a female. I don’t know if this is hard for the viewer to figure out, I thought it was pretty obvious. The puppets at the end and Joe’s music makes me realize that we really would have flourished had we lived in the seventies. We would have all been rich from making children’s TV shows ala Hot Fudge and Sid & Marty Croft.
Appeared on episode 15.

#6

PCP Robot

There were a few things going on here. I was obsessed with Paul’s Boutique by the Beastie Boys where they talk about PCP many times on that album. I had a can of golden spray paint and wanted to tag the back of the abandoned A&P grocery market on the outskirts of the downtown Rochester park. I figured PCP by itself wouldn’t be that good, so PCP what? “Robot,” that sounded cool. Joe or Jerry took a pic of me next to this. Then there was a lot of talk about PCP Robot for a few weeks. I began writing a movie that I honestly thought we could film. But it became too big to film, and evolved into what is known as The Ricky Hamilton Story.
Appeared on episode 12.

#5

The Holes

This was the first skit I ever did with 30MOM, I made it up on the spot, then brought my Roland drum machine R70 to the studio. In this skit you can see how I was dressed. I literally was just chilling at Rochester park, this was how I dressed on a normal day-to-day basis, and, like many 30MOM skits, this also serves as documentation of where we were at at that time, which was 1993.
Appeared on episode 8.

#4

The Statue 4

This was one of my favorite skits from before I was a part of 30 Minutes of Madness, I don’t know if I appear at the end of this show or something. I love the thrash metal Unsane music, the goth chicks and the horrifying metal freak that Jerry is.
Appeared on episode 8.

#3

A Southern Tragedy

This is the first movie I ever made that I would consider to be cool, or that I could say I was proud of. It also documents the creative spirit that was in the air at the infamous Turtle Creek Apartments, which was the first place I ever moved to on my own when I was 19. I assembled this together, Joe filmed it, and Jerry was upstairs in bed with a goth chick while it was shot. I think he didn’t want to have anything to do with the rape scene in the movie, but after seeing it he decided to contribute and Jerry did a wonderful job editing it. Also the ending with all the people and me in the mask was something we filmed another day that Jerry shot and included along with the changing colors to give it a more surreal ending. Jerry edited it while I was in the studio with my Roland R-70 drum machine and Quadraverb effect unit.
Appeared on episode 9.

#2

Window 13

I really liked the completely freaky and surreal vibe that Jerry tapped into in this skit. I had been a big influence as far as doing things less silly and more surreal, or even dark. I was a little hurt that I wasn’t part of this skit, though hurt isn’t the right word and neither is jealous. It made me stop and think, because I felt this was better than things that I had done with them to date at this time, I guess it’s my own insecurity or something, You shouldn’t be jealous of your friends doing creatively awesome things. I guess I just felt like I perhaps in a way influenced this type of thing a bit and they had taken it really far and I wasn’t there. Becky Beverly was a natural and I liked the fact that Rachel Angelini appeared in it too. I also liked the way downtown Rochester was portrayed here—they used the storefront an old-timey clothing store, I forgot the name, but the front windows of the children mannequins is my favorite part. I was pleased that my music was used. These were part of my bedroom Kurzweil K2000 tapes that Joe made me record. Joe had brought a tape deck and just left it next to my Kurzweil, it was kind of a workshop of sorts, this was before I had a studio.
Appeared on episode 12.

#1

Sally & Boblo

This is a pretty magical skit. Jerry had some props, a brown Barbie-like doll, and I had wanted to do something influenced by the movie The Baby (1973), so this was my chance. Many friends were pretty freaked out by Sally & Boblo, it seems that for some, the moment you don’t see the humor in it, it becomes the moment you are terrified. I have had many friends ask what it meant, seeking a rational explanation of sorts. So I am pretty proud that some are perplexed by this short, in a way that was a common goal for me and my involvement with 30MOM. I’m also proud of the soundtrack that I did, as well as Jerry’s contributions to it as well.
Appeared on episode 15.