Twenty-five years ago, millions of people nervously looked forward to New Year’s Eve.
When the clock struck midnight, they thought, will they lose power? Do airplanes fall from the sky? Will the banks collapse and the world system collapse?
Such nightmarish imaginings were never based in reality, but the public had a real fear that the computer systems society had become increasingly dependent on would fail at the stroke of midnight, ushering in the darkness of the early 2000s.
For years, computer engineers and government officials worked on what was then called 2000 issueAlso known as the Millennium Bug. Beginning in the 1950s and 60s, programmers stripped the first two digits of the year from code to save time and money. It was assumed that the code would be replaced long before the turn of the millennium.
But in the following decades, engineers began sounding the alarm that if computer systems were changed from 1999 to 1900, it would cause massive disruptions affecting electrical grids, nuclear power plants, hospitals, supermarkets, government agencies and home computer users.
In the final months and weeks of 1999, officials expressed optimism that the crisis would be averted and downplayed the impact of the countless hours and billions of dollars invested in the problem. But that didn’t stop people from panicking and hoarding food, water and weapons. celebrity to weigh Whether they were terrible or not. The Simpsons episode “Life is a problem, then you die” Parody of fear.
But New Year’s Eve came and went, and the effect was relatively small. As a result, Y2K became somewhat of a the punchline and one Exaggerated threatDespite the unsung heroes who worked diligently behind the scenes to prepare.
In 1999, the actor and recent Saturday Night Live Cast member Kyle Mooney, then 15, was somewhat disappointed by the anticlimactic ending of the Y2K panic.
Twenty-five years later, he directed his first film, Y2KWhich conjures up a nightmare scenario far beyond what anyone had predicted Sean Rameswaram spoke with Muni about his memories of Y2K and a cast that reimagined late ’90s culture that mostly grew up after the event he portrayed.
Below is a portion of their conversation, edited for length and clarity. There’s more in the full podcast, so take a listen Today, explained on Apple Podcasts, Spotifyor Wherever you find podcasts.
Sean Rameswaram
Tell us about your creations.
Kyle Mooney
I made a movie called Y2KI wrote it with my friend Ivan [Winter]And it is somewhat based on our lives. I was 15 when Y2K happened. He was 14 years old. And for those of us who lived through Y2K, it was a disaster and nothing really happened. And I think I’ve always been mildly obsessed with it. So one day the idea of making a movie about “teens go to a party and Y2K actually happens” hit me. I pitched it to Evan and we started working on it.
Sean Rameswaram
amazing Can you tell us what you were doing on New Year’s Eve 1999?
Kyle Mooney
I went out with my friend Mark. We watched the MTV New Year’s special. So I think, enjoying Carson Daly riffing with Kathy Griffin. I don’t know if I was particularly nervous or afraid of what might happen come midnight. But my mom was prepared and she got some stuff just in case, I guess, the world got destroyed somehow.
At the moment, it just sort of came and went. I don’t know what I thought of it until I started, again, slightly obsessed with it. It would only hit me once. But I don’t really know that I’ve put a lot of immediate thought into it right now.
Sean Rameswaram
And of course, you cast your movie with a bunch of teenagers. I wanted to ask if something about this buildup and this meltdown felt essentially juvenile to you.
Kyle Mooney
I’m sure that’s true. The story we were always interested in telling was, to a degree, a take on the teen culture of the era, especially, like, all these movies were directed at us. it was She is all that, Can’t Hardly Wait, American Pie, 10 Things I Hate About You.
To a degree, I don’t know that I thought in terms of, like, it’s speaking to teenagers, it’s like the culture that exploded at me, and I wanted to go back to that.
Sean Rameswaram
Unlike all the movies you just named, this movie takes a fairly dark turn. As many people as you are willing to share, what happens when the clock strikes 12 Y2Kyour movie?
Kyle Mooney
At midnight, the machines go mad and basically start killing people. It’s weird. I don’t think I’ve ever done anything that was possibly that violent, but I was just really excited to do something that caused a reaction by making a left turn. I really hope that if people watch it, you know, there’s some laughs, there’s some tears, and there’s some moments like, “Oh my shit, this is crazy.”
Sean Rameswaram
[Laughs.]
Kyle Mooney
Did I say, “Oh my shit”?
Sean Rameswaram
[Laughs.] you did
Kyle Mooney
Oh my shit. I kind of hate that.
Sean Rameswaram
We also have a long line of films where technology turns on us and terrifies us. And Y2KYour movie, the latest. Why do we love to see technology try to kill us? Did you think about that while making this movie?
Kyle Mooney
I think that fear is constantly present. I think with the introduction of electronics and robotics, there was always the thought, when are these things going to turn on us? Even while working on this movie, we started in 2019 and now it is coming in 2024. We have seen an evolution of AI and it has become seemingly scarier and more real even when we first started talking about it.
Sean Rameswaram
Many of the actors in your movies weren’t even alive on New Year’s Eve 1999. Did you need to be like Camp Y2K, where you gave them the essentials of what life was like at the time?
Kyle Mooney
We’ve created playlists for them. We have sent them a list of movies to watch. And, you know, any phrases or references that they don’t know, obviously, we’ll fill them in. It was up to them to decide how much they wanted to invest in learning about the culture and the time.
I think the characters, even though they’re archetypes of the time and some of them are very clearly late ’90s, early 2000s, there’s a universal quality to them that I think even our young actors can relate to — the vulnerability of being this age
Sean Rameswaram
Y2K, beyond your movies, is have a moment. I mean, there are Y2K vintage clothing stores. Charli XCX, who has had a huge year, has a song on her album called “Von Dutch.” In a lot of ways did Y2K come back — you know, kids using digital point-and-shoot cameras again — help you sell this movie to A24?
Kyle Mooney
I think so. I mean, I can’t say that I’m like the king of the zeitgeist in any way, you know what I mean? But you get the sense that the Y2K fashion aesthetic is coming back. But it has grown from concept to now. And now I think I’m lucky that we’re getting it out in time because we’re probably at a point where people are going to be sick after it, you know what I mean? And we might be away for a month or two.
Sean Rameswaram
Do you think we can learn anything from Y2K, from your experience making this movie?
Kyle Mooney
You know, Y2K was something we were overprepared for. And, as we said, nothing happened. These were people working on computers and making sure we were ready. So there are these unsung heroes. Who knows what would have happened if they hadn’t done what they did?
But I think we’ve seen in our fairly recent culture and history that there are moments that we weren’t prepared for and then changed our lives. And so there’s always something to think about, like, “Well, we should take this a little bit seriously and think about it and make sure we’re all good if something bad happens.” Let’s not be too obsessive about it, but let’s be smart about it.
