This summer the show will take a small break for the first part of the sunny months. Then, in mid-summer, somewhere around the show’s two year anniversary of being online – we’ll launch Season 4 –  our biggest season yet – and also – the Final Season of “Meet the Mayfarers.”

Originally I had intended to release one episode a year for the whole year. However, somewhere near the end of the editing process, I decided to merge episodes together, which worked creatively, but lessened the overall amount of episodes, thus causing the need for a break.

But it won’t be a totally Mayfarerless start to the summer. We’ll also have a few remaining sketches from our vault, ready to unleash onto the world.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the zaniness of Season 3. This season has been a big, broad, fun, sugery, candy like season, small bite sized stories pushing the “Reality” of the story about as far as we could go. The next season ties everything together – with one full, feature length story that will answer all the questions of the family.

Thanks so much for your support and viewership throughout the years. I hope you enjoy this week’s episode – and look forward to the new season to come!

And that’s why we need to collaborate.

Over the past few days I’ve been in the company of some truly talented people. Between LA Web Fest and the Celebrate the Web event – I’m constantly inspired by the creators in the Web Series space. These are people who take their creativity and run with it – creating excellent results.

And yet – despite their inspiring shows, there’s a part of me standing at these events, drink in hand, thinking that all these people are climbing their own individual mountain. Every single one is working hard and struggling to climb their own mountain in this biz. And that’s just too tough.

There has to be a way to collaborate. There has to be a way where we can all take this collective talent and creativity and use it to help us all do what we do on a bigger scale. If we don’t collaborate, we die.

This is the genesis behind the “Mayfarers Go Hollywood” episodes.

Years ago – when I was looking at the media space and started to see that the web was the answer, I stumbled across “Life From the Inside.” I’d spent years in the indie film world. And while there were many talented people in that world, the successful ones were doing projects that were so far from the type of material I wanted to do. (Slow paced arty movie about homeless heroin war vets all discussing the “Serious issue of the day.”)

When I discovered “Life From the Inside” and other similar shows, such as “Goodnight Burbank” “Break a Leg” “the ‘Burg” and “We Need Girlfriends” it opened my eyes. Yes! Finally! Here are people sharing their creativity and stories, and finding an audience. And doing it in a witty way. I made a decision at that moment to stop going into a world I didn’t fit and embrace a world that I felt comfortable in.

Look at LFTI – a witty show, with smart writing, and fast paced dialogue. This is what I like to watch – not because I “have to” to study the market, but because I want to.

When the Life from the Inside Youtube account subscribed to my Mayfarers Youtube account, months before I launched, I thought it was cool. When I went out for coffee with the creators of the show in LA and I saw how incredibly nice they are, I thought – what a fascinating interconnected world we live in – when I found myself six months later filming a sitcom story with them I thought – I absolutely love this space.

That’s what Mayfarers Go Hollywood is. It’s reaching out to collaborate. It’s working with people I admire to do something that can hopefully help us all. (It’s also about goofy situations involving orgies, animal mascots and Papua New Guinea, but that’s another story.)

And that’s what we – as a Web New Media community –  need to do more of. We need to get together to figure this out. To do something greater than the sum of our own parts.

Who’s with me?

Some of them will be small stories, some of them will be an entire season story arc, some will be epic adventures in Hollywood,  - some will be goofy, some will be…well, they’ll all be pretty goofy.

The early part of Season 3 will be smaller stories about individual characters, while the final part of the season will be one 16 episode story arc, involving the return of almost all the characters – and leading to a surprising conclusion to the series – revealing who will finally get Porter Mayfarer’s money.

I want to thank everyone who has watched over the years. Being involved in this show has been so fun, and fulfilling.

I hope you join us this year as we embark on our final year of Mayfarers fun.

I did this for a lot of reasons. The number one reason is that the Internet has changed considerably since I was first conceiving and shooting the show in 2007. The rule was “short form ruled.” I decided to do something told entirely in short form bite sized pieces. But in recent years, as people have grown accustomed to watching shows online, it seems as if some audiences actually prefer the longer content. With Apple TV, Google TV, and the Roku box – it seems like everyone wants a “lean back” online experience.  Also, I’ve heard complaints from some people who want to watch the entire run of the show – that they have to wade through dozens of pre-roll ads to actually watch the show.

So I thought – why create this barrier to entry? Why not serve up the show in a totally new way than it was before, and hopefully gain some viewers while we’re at it.

In looking at the old episodes I thought – “well, really, they weren’t designed as long form, but I could easily put them into sitcom length format. I mean, that’s what the show is, really.” I knew it has been so long, in Internet time, since we had our last new episode, that really people need to start from the beginning to latch onto the show.

So starting today and for the next few weeks, we’ll have the “Mayfarers Mega Show” released. They’ll be six episodes total, comprising of the longer story arcs of the show. It doesn’t include the stand alone episodes, the “Chronicles” about solo characters, nor does it include our very bizarre holiday episodes. These are simply the show episodes – redone in way that hopefully makes you want to watch more.

So, now, sit back…lean back, grab a bottle of your favorite beverage and see how it all started. Thanks for watching! And please stick around for the launch of our brand new season on Feb. 23rd!

It wasn’t supposed to take this long. As I mentioned before, the original goal was for the show to launch and new episodes would come every week for a full year. We almost made it. But filming new episodes, and just life in general got in the way. But we’re going to make up for it.

So – what does the New Year look like for the Mayfarers? We’ll have a special sneak peek episode of Season 3 – starting this week with “A Very Mayfarers New Year.”

January will consist of a few more sketches as well as a re-release of some of Season 1 & 2.

Season 3 will launch on Wednesday, February 2nd – On Groundhog Day. Sadly, This will not be a Groundhog Day episode. My apologies for that.

Once the show is relaunched we will have new episodes – every week for the rest of the year. (Perhaps taking the month of August off – if the Europeans can do it – so can the Mayfarers)

Thank you everyone for your patience and I’m looking forward to sharing these new episodes with you in the New Year!

But this isn’t the new season. For the next few months we’ll have sketches, behind the scenes, and general tomfoolery every week, for the rest of the year.

I’ve written many times before how making this show brought back my love of filming. How we all feel like kids in the sandbox making this.

As someone who had been use to the rigorous world of independent film making – creating a webseries was a revelation. When we started doing this we found ourselves finishing early. We not only “made the day” but we’d find that we had hours and hours of daylight still available. I was used to 20 hour film shooting marathons, so this was a welcome surprise.

So – knowing this – I started writing small sketches. Just little goofy pieces that have nothing to do with the show. And so, as we shot the show over the year – when we finished early, and had an extra hour or two, we’d all just do these little shorts. Fake commercials. Parodies. As long as it was fun, we tried it. There are no rhyme or reason to these. Nor do they tie into the plot of the show at all. They’re just for fun. Same actors, different material.

For me I find it special watching these, in particular – as I can see, on screen, me falling in love with filming once again.

So – with that in mind – take them for what they are. Goofy little behind the scenes vignettes of what we do to have fun – on a shoot where we’re already having the time of our lives.

Starting this week, we will begin to release new material online. It won’t be new episodes of Season 3 – not just yet – but sketches, behind the scenes, and much more, every week – for the rest of the year.

But then the question: What took so long?

A lot of things.

The plan all along was to release a year’s worth of episodes. “One family. One year.” But along the way, we were all pretty excited about what was going on with the show online so we jumped back into filming last fall – expanding the show far, far beyond the original one year. Throughout fall and spring, we shot many more episodes, more than what’s even online now. My plan was to edit them this summer – and continue the release pattern, barely stopping for a break.

Then, we lost our star, and matriarch of the show – Candace Hopkins, as the summer began.

For me – I had to stop editing. Having her loss be so close to the freshly shot footage was difficult. There were hours and hours and hours of footage to go through. I just couldn’t edit it at the time.

So we all went off to other projects.

Now – months have passed, the show has been dormant. As fall started I slowly started to assemble the footage again. And I found the experience to be far from a sad one.

I found it joyful.

Joyful because there are hours and hours, episodes and episodes of discoveries. There’s still so much of Candace out there – so much for her to still be a part of the show. I found myself laughing during her scenes, and smiling at the good times we all had.

Every editor knows the feeling of knowing an actor even if they don’t see them over a long time. Months can pass, editing a film, but an editor sees the actor on a daily basis on the screen, so much so that they feel they are with them every day. The same holds true in this case. There have been moments when, while editing footage, I think of something I want to email Candace, and switch over to my email, to compose a message. Reality sets in, as it always does.

But it is a testament to how much Candace is still part of the show. How much of her is still left on the screen, to share with her friends, family, and audience at large.

I’ve found the past month or so of editing the new footage to be filled with warm memories. I hope you enjoy them as well.

What many people didn’t know was that she has been going through chemo the past few years, and was in such pain. I kept saying to her – “Candace, you don’t have to come to the shoot, seriously! I can write around you.” But she wouldn’t have it. In fact, as the show progressed, she was in the show just as much as before she was sick. Most times, because of her upbeat attitude, it was easy to forget the hell she had been going through. Only brief moments, small signs and hints of pain would show themselves, after a particularly long take standing up for instance. It was at these times I tried to get her to sit down. She said, “I want to be here.” She was enjoying herself so.

Candace said the most amazing part of watching the show as they were released, was seeing her physical transformation as the show progressed. To see her weight loss, and then see her as she battled cancer. It’s easy to forgot how much time as passed. A running joke with all of the cast members over the years has been the duration of the shoot. (On and off, for two and a half years) I kept saying to everyone, “We’re almost done, we’re almost done! Keep at it!” I think Candace was glad that she was able to finish out shooting the series. I am proud to have had those moments working with her.

I am saddened today. I feel privileged to have worked with her these past few years on the show. And I am inspired by her strength.

She will be missed.

That’s not to say the show, or our site will be taking a break. Starting next month, we’ll have sketches, shorts, and bloopers released on a regular basis. They won’t be episodes, but hopefully they’ll be able to have little bites of the Mayfarers Madness, to hold you over until the full course this fall.

I’ll be posting more details about the summer schedule as the weeks go back. Thanks so much for watching the show!

It’s great being back on set – with all the actors and crew. Everyone knows their characters, and is already “in the groove.” Also – we’re having a few new additional characters as well. So far its been a lot of fun.

The nature of our show’s release pattern is strange. We’ve been laughing about the fact that the episodes we’re shooting today won’t “air” for another year – and that the episode that’s up this week we shot a year and a half ago.

Time flies when you’re having fun.

I’ve been saying for a while now that this weekend is the “final Mayfarers” shoot – and, for the most part, it probably will be. Once you see how the show ends – you’ll see there’s a lot of possibilities for spin offs about individual characters – so, who knows what the future will bring.

But one thing is certain, this will be the last time the family will be back together, shooting our shows in a cottage by the sea…