Noah Hutton is the Writer and Director of Lapsis, a science fiction movie I had the privilege of seeing at Denver Film Festival 2020 (#DFF43). It’s described thusly on the film’s website:

In a parallel present, delivery man Ray Tincelli is struggling to support himself and his ailing younger brother. After a series of two-bit hustles and unsuccessful swindles, Ray takes a job in a strange new realm of the gig economy: trekking deep into the forest, pulling cable over miles of terrain to connect large, metal cubes that link together the new quantum trading market. As he gets pulled deeper into the zone, he encounters growing hostility and the threat of robot cablers, and must choose to either help his fellow workers or to get rich and get out.

The movie is fantastic. It’s not only fun as hell in its world-building, but is an interesting commentary on the gig economy and labor writ large. In our conversation, Noah and I talk about the pros and cons of being independent consultants, ballot measures like California’s recent Proposition 22, WWE classifying its performers as independent contracts yet enacting draconian measures like taking over their Twitch and Cameo accounts, blue collar vs white collar sci-fi and a ton more. We also talk about the advantages and challenges of working in the same industry as your successful parents. If you don’t know who his parents are, Google it. You’ll figure it out quickly.

You can stay up to date with all of Noah’s work at his own website: NoahHutton.com.

This episode is available on iTunes, for streaming on Stitcher, or at the Jon of All Trades homepage.

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