Timecode Cowboys | Season Two | Ep. 1 | The Universal Backlot: Hollywood’s Factory Floor
In this S2 premiere episode, we explore the history, mythology, and everyday reality of Universal Studios Hollywood — not as a theme park, but as a working studio that’s been shaping Hollywood for more than a century.
We’re joined on a backlot field trip by special guests Ben Sommer (@ben.gordo), Director of Programmatic Partnerships at NBCUniversal, and Andrew Paz (@andybrand), co-founder of Big Time (@bigtimebigtimebigtimebigtime), bringing insider access and fresh perspective along for the ride.
In this episode, we cover:
- 🎞️ The birth of the studio tour and the chaos of silent-era filmmaking
- 🧠 Life inside the machine: soundstages, commissaries, parking politics, and daily studio rhythms
- 🦈 How Spielberg and Verna Fields saved Jaws when the shark wouldn’t work
- 🌍 Universal logo history, late-’90s DVD bumpers, and studio branding obsessions
- 🔥 Studio fires, lost archives, and preservation vs. reinvention
It’s a reset. A road trip. And a statement of intent for Season Two: fewer walls, more field trips, and a deeper connection to the places where film history is still being made.
🎬 Films & TV Shows Discussed:
- The Time Tunnel (1966)
- Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1964)
- How the West Was Won (1962)
- The Battle of the Bulge (1965)
- Grand Prix (1966)
- 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
- Airport (1970)
- Columbo (1971)
- The Towering Inferno (1974)
- Earthquake (1974)
- Airport 1975 (1974)
- Jaws (1975)
- Midway (1976)
- Alien (1979)
- Apocalypse Now (1979)
- The Rockford Files (1974)
- Hart to Hart (1979)
- Jurassic Park (1993)
- The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)
- The Mummy (1999)
- The Mummy Returns (2001)
- CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2000)
- Desperate Housewives (2004)
- The Artist (2011)
- Stranger Things (2016)
••Babylon (2022)
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