MONDO EXTRAS

Sophia: They were trying to make a TV show. What was frustrating to me -- I don't know if I could speak for the whole town, but I think I can speak for most of them -- what's frustrating to us is that certain things we wanted to do, we would be stopped, saying, "No, it doesn't work with what we're doing," meaning what CBS is doing. We were focused on building the world; they were focused on making a TV show.

MG:Can you give me an example?

Sophia: Well...I don't know if you could tell or not: I tried to overthrow the Council every day I was there. But often, the staff intervened. [all laugh]

MG: Well, good for you for trying. Did you have a sense as to which of the kids were getting the most screen time?

Sophia: Yeah. Definitely. In a way, you sort of control how much screen time you get depending on what you do. I mean, a lot of the kids who weren't on much, they were maybe shy-ish kids. You knew how much screen time you were going to get. Because if you would approach the cameras, if you were doing something interesting, they would film you.

Lori:For example, conducting a social experiment. [laughs]

MG:Yeah, I was going to ask you about that. The thing with the money and the pot, was that actually your money?

Sophia: It was my idea. But I think I was Laborers at that time, so [the producers] gave me a few buffalo nickels.

MG: So they helped sponsor it?

Sophia: Right. But you know what? As the show went on, money became less and less of a big deal as we realized we could kind of, you know, steal things from the stores.

MG: [laughs]

Sophia: At first, we were so obsessed with getting highly paid, but people just didn't seem to care any more after a while.

MG: You said that you tried to overthrow the Town Council. Did you ever consider running?

Sophia: I did run.

MG: You did?

Sophia: I didn't win, so they cut it out. And I gave a very bad speech, so...

MG: Did you run in both elections or just one?

Sophia: I ran in just one election. In fact, a lot of the Green district ran in that election. Like, half the kids, anyway.