Netflix's Maniac Mainframe [GRTA]

Fabrication and programming of a "horribly depressed" mainframe for Netflix's Maniac.

2017
Justin Theroux hugs the mainframe / Photo by Michele K. Short / © Netflix Netflix's <i>Maniac</i> Mainframe [GRTA] image

GRTA consisted of 1,476 RGB addressable LEDs controlled by a Teensy 3.1. Visuals were drawn in a custom GUI and the time-based animation data was generated by a PHP script that was dispatched over a specially-crafted serial protocol. In addition to the LEDs, the protocol also supported manipulating the 7-segment numerical displays, analog panel meters, backlights, and hard drive activity lights. Triggered by various key commands, the mainframe could run autonomously or enter a user-controlled puppet mode.

Netflix's <i>Maniac</i> Mainframe [GRTA] image
Netflix's <i>Maniac</i> Mainframe [GRTA] image
Netflix's <i>Maniac</i> Mainframe [GRTA] image
Netflix's <i>Maniac</i> Mainframe [GRTA] image
INGREDIENTS

  • Arduino/C++
  • PHP
  • Javascript
  • Circuit design
  • Fabrication
  • SVG

LINKS

YouTube: Maniac | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix
IMDb: Alan Watts, mainframe programmer

VIDEOS

PRESS
2019  Interiors, Interview with Alex Digerlando, 2019
'The twinkling lights of the GRTA, along with her animated face and her teardrop were all done practically and we hired Alan Watts, an artist with a background in programming, to make all of that happen. He sat off-camera and ran codes to essentially puppeteer her actions.'

2019  Deadline, For ‘Maniac,’ Production Designer Alex DiGerlando Crafts Retrofuturistic Look That Is “A Very Hard Thing To Verbalize” To This Day, June 11, 2019
'It’s funny, Patrick wrote it as if the computer was blinking and smiling at Owen. I don’t know that he necessarily meant that so literally, but we found this programmer in Austin, and I was like, “Could you program the lights to be animated?”'

2018  The New Yorker, The Design of "Maniac" Offers an Uncanny Imitation of Life, September 21, 2018
'Dominating the laboratory and overwhelming the visual scheme is a grand and rickety mainframe: an artificial intelligence that has developed emotions. This is an endearingly ridiculous machine, one whose buttons selectively light up to impersonate a woman's face.'

© 2023 Alan Watts / Data X   [top]