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Sock Tease: Sifl (left) and Olly are MTV's prime time sock puppets.
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February 18–25, 1999
20 questions
Interview by Patrick Rapa
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1999 might be remembered as the year of the sock puppet, thanks to MTV's oddball comedy show, Sifl &Olly. The show's creators, Matt Crocco (the voice of Sifl, the black dress sock) and Liam Lynch (Olly, the whitish tube sock), are two 27-year-old friends who amused each other with silly skits and songs growing up in Memphis. In 1996, Liam decided to make a video of one of their skits as a Christmas present for Matt, but it was 3 a.m. and the only materials he could come up with were socks. As he explains, "It could have easily been buckets." They sent the tape to MTV Europe, who signed up the socks for 30-second blurbs. MTV America caught on this summer, airing half-hour-length shows. Sometimes Sifl and Olly do interviews (last season they chatted up Death and a supermarket checkout scanner), or pitch products for a home shopping network, and they end each show with a song. Now entering its second season, Sifl & Olly has moved from its 1 a.m. time slot to 8 p.m. every weekday, and its subtle humor and low-tech look are quickly putting sock puppets on the map, leaving the bucket industry to lament what could have been.
You're still using the original socks. Have you ever washed them?
M: We've washed Olly once. Sifl can get pretty dirty without anyone noticing.
Who are your fans?
L: It's the weirdest range of people. It's kind of like saying, "Who are Monty Python's fans?"… I get equal amount of e-mail from doctors and lawyers and professors at Harvard as I do from 10-year-old skate punk kids. It's just whether or not you're willing to be weird.
The show has a very different sense of humor than most comedy shows. What's the secret of your success?
L: It has nothing to do with sock puppets; it has to do with personalities. And we're not funny like comedian funny, we're funny the way friends are funny with each other.
Some of your fans on the Sockhead e-mail list claim to have seen or heard their names slipped into the show.
L: We throw their names in there just to give them a shout-out because they're a supportive group.… Last season we had reverse messages mixed into our show and people actually found those as well.
How do you feel about the move to prime time and MTV's interspersing videos with the show's skits?
M: [The shows] will first all air with videos, then [MTV] will take the videos out and show them at their full half-hour length.
How much does it cost to produce one show?
L: A lot… let's just say we drive solid gold cars, OK baby?
M: We don't have many car crash scenes.
L: It's somewhere between cable access and Seinfeld.
It seems that even with the move to prime time, Sifl & Olly is becoming more risqué.
M: Our first show last season we interviewed an Orgasm, so I think interviewing Male and Female hormones [as in this season's opener] is a lot less risqué than that. It happens as randomly as it doesn't happen. It's like swearing on the show. Sifl and Olly don't swear a lot. There might be a word beeped out, but it's probably in just the sort of instance where you world normally swear in real life.
L: Like at a car wreck, you'd be like "holy beep."
M: Yeah. Holy beep!
L: We're censoring ourselves.
Any plans to release an album of the show-ending songs?
L: I've had about 70,000 requests for a CD on our Web site.… We're more aware of the need than [MTV is].
M: They're doing the right thing, slowly but surely getting us out there… We don't want to shove it in everybody's face and make it seem like you have to like this and this is the next Beavis and Butthead.
L: It's a good show to find on your own terms and discover and feel like it's yours.
Sifl & Olly airs every weeknight at 8 p.m. on MTV.
