Practice Makes Parent

Guest (Male): Help show kids the importance of marriage, family, and faith in Christ. Support Focus on the Family as we launch the animated film *Adventures in Odyssey: Journey into the Impossible*. Over 9,000 children each year make decisions for Christ after listening to *Adventures in Odyssey*, and you can help by donating to the film’s launch. There is a dollar-for-dollar match until May 1, so your gift will be doubled when you give today. Simply go to focusonthefamily.com/impossible.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Well hi and welcome to a special edition of *Practice Makes Parent*. There’s something happening here at Focus on the Family this week, and everyone is so excited. It’s the *Adventures in Odyssey* takeover, and here’s why we’re so excited. If you’ve never heard of *Adventures in Odyssey*, first of all, where have you been? But it is a radio drama that Focus on the Family has produced for almost 40 years. It’s on the radio every week. There’s an *Adventures in Odyssey* club.

And if you already know about *Adventures in Odyssey* and you’re a fan, you’re probably going to jump out of your seat with the news we’re about to share. *Adventures in Odyssey* is producing an animated feature film that’s releasing in the fall. The movie is called *Journey into the Impossible*, and it’s inviting families into the prequel of the Whitaker family’s story. *Adventures in Odyssey* research shows that 9,000 children per year make a salvation decision after listening to *Adventures in Odyssey* episodes.

It’s a wonderful outreach and it’s an opportunity for you, your family, your kids, and your grandkids to enjoy world-class entertainment that’s rooted in biblical values. Today, we’re going to share with you an episode of the *Adventures in Odyssey* podcast that’s hosted by Bob Smithhauser and Jesse Florea. Their guest is Jennifer Arthur, who has been instrumental in getting the new animated movie on the big screen. Listen to all the details, and if you’d like to help contribute to the film’s production, there’s an opportunity for you to donate. We have a match going on, so every dollar you give will go twice as far. If you’d like to contribute, go to focusonthefamily.com/impossible and thanks for your gift.

Bob Smithhauser: Hello, Odyssey fans! I’m Bob, producer of the *Adventures in Odyssey* club.

Jesse Florea: And I’m Jesse with Focus on the Family *Clubhouse* magazine. Welcome to the official *Adventures in Odyssey* podcast. Today on the podcast, we’re sitting down with someone who’s played a major role in bringing the *Adventures in Odyssey* movie to life. But first, here’s the latest news.

*Adventures in Odyssey* Album 80, *Re-Written*, releases on CD on March 1 and starts airing on the radio and online March 7. That’s right around the corner.

Bob Smithhauser: Downloads are already available, and all the episodes have been in the club for a few months now. Remember, this is the last album that releases on download, CD, and the radio. After this, all new albums are club exclusives. In fact, the first three episodes of the next album, Album 81, are already available in the club.

Jesse Florea: But if you’re holding out to listen on CD or the radio to Album 80, the wait is almost over. You can find links for download and CD or to find a radio station in your area on our website.

Bob Smithhauser: And you can listen to Albums 80 and 81 and all the rest of our albums in the club at adventuresinodyssey.com. Now, let’s turn our attention from the speaker to the big screen. Jennifer Arthur is a name that some Odyssey fans won’t recognize.

Jesse Florea: But she’s been a key part of getting the Odyssey movie from a long-standing idea into an actual animated film coming to theaters this fall. She’s a Vice President here at Focus on the Family. We’ll find out what she does, as well as her role with the new movie. Let’s talk to Jennifer. Jennifer, welcome to the podcast!

Jennifer Arthur: Thank you. Very excited to be here.

Jesse Florea: Yours is a name that *Adventures in Odyssey* fans might not know, but you’ve become a key player in the Odyssey world. Tell us about your role here at Focus on the Family.

Jennifer Arthur: Certainly. I’m the Vice President of Marketing and Content. The content that includes is *Adventures in Odyssey* and our publishing team. That’s where I’ve gotten to be more involved with *Adventures in Odyssey* is having that under me. And then also, I have been involved in the production of the new film that we are producing.

Bob Smithhauser: You came to Focus a few years ago from another company our listeners have heard of, Amazon. Tell us what you did there and how you made the journey to Focus.

Jennifer Arthur: To not go on for too long, I was at Amazon for 16 years. I did a whole lot there, but to summarize it, I started in finance and then I moved over to the product side of things. I ended up working in 10 different categories from books, music, and video. I launched our gourmet store, was part of launching our marketplace business where other people sell on Amazon, relaunched our toy and baby stores when we parted ways with Toys "R" Us. And then my last job, I actually oversaw the jewelry and watch business. I did a whole lot over my tenure.

Jesse Florea: Wow. And so what caused you to come over here to Focus on the Family and bring those skills and talents with you?

Jennifer Arthur: I actually had a stint in between Amazon and Focus on the Family where I was doing consulting because I had three young children when I left Amazon and I wanted to be able to spend more time with my family. After COVID, some circumstances had changed. Years ago, when my youngest, who is now 13, was born, I wanted to come and work at Focus on the Family, but it wasn’t necessarily the right timing to move our family from Washington.

We were back in Colorado and the opportunity came up. I was praying with a friend about what was the right job for me to really pursue, and at the end of our prayer, she said, "You should look at Focus on the Family." And I said, "Why didn't I think of that? I wanted to work here so long ago." So I applied, and here I am. I was really thrilled to get to come.

Bob Smithhauser: Amazon is known for being driven by data and numbers, and of course, you coming from a marketing strategy standpoint. When you come to Focus on the Family, what did you learn at Amazon that you've applied in your work here?

Jennifer Arthur: I naturally was a very data-driven person, so I think that’s why Amazon was a great fit for me. But it’s interesting because I actually think that there’s two really important things. One, which the data does feed into, but Amazon, the number one most important thing that was always spoken about, decisions were made around, was the customer. We would often say, "Start with the customer and work backwards."

What are the needs of the customers? It was always, "Are we innovating on behalf of the customer?" If we’re wanting to do something new, is it benefiting and serving the customer? I’ve brought to Focus just having a very strong constituent experience perspective and really wanting to make sure that everything we do, our constituents are delighted with it and it is serving their needs most importantly. I think as a ministry even more so that becomes important.

From a data perspective, we used to always joke as we would tell people to think from numbers. You can look at things that you could make an estimate, or you can measure it and really be accurate. Some of it is letting the data give us the information and guide us. I think the most important part for me has always been that we can have a hypothesis about things, but data is going to really tell us truth.

Having that perspective of thinking first and foremost about the constituent, what their needs are, using the data to help guide us because the constituents with their behavior, our fans with the things that they show us they’re interested in, they’re telling us what is most important to them. By listening and looking at the data, we can make sure that we’re serving our fans and delighting them.

Jesse Florea: That’s been a huge help to Focus on the Family and to our constituents of people who are listening and consuming our content, whether it’s the magazines, the books, *Adventures in Odyssey*, all that stuff. Personally, you mentioned that you knew Focus on the Family. You’d thought about working here years and years ago. What’s your history with the ministry and maybe your history with *Adventures in Odyssey* as well with your family and young kids?

Jennifer Arthur: Growing up, my parents listened to the Focus on the Family broadcast a lot. We did a lot of road trips. And then when I was single after college, but even after I had gotten married, a lot of times the Focus on the Family broadcast would come on and I would end up sitting in my car to be able to finish listening to it because it always had a wealth of wisdom. Interestingly, I was just past the *Adventures in Odyssey* age group when *Adventures in Odyssey* came out. So growing up, I didn't necessarily know it as much.

But I had brought my kids here when they were young and we saw it and got excited about it. They leaned a little bit stronger into the *Imagination Station* books, so we would read the *Imagination Station* a lot. But then my youngest, when he was in first grade, they would listen to *Adventures in Odyssey* in his class at different times throughout the year, and so he started getting more excited about it.

I started listening with him, but I have to admit, I have been since I came to Focus doing a lot of catching up so that I can really know all of the characters and everyone from *Adventures in Odyssey*. It’s still super fun even not having grown up with it. As an adult, the stories still do touch me. I think the coolest thing has been getting to see the fans, hear the testimonies, and just knowing what an incredible impact it has.

Bob Smithhauser: We want to ask you about the animated Odyssey movie coming out later this year. But first, we have a totally random question from one of our listeners. It’s something we call a TRQ. Little Bug wants to know, what’s your favorite hobby?

Jennifer Arthur: That’s a tough one. I would probably say tennis. I don’t get to do it as much these days, but I love getting out and playing tennis. I’m not crafty, so I don’t have any cool hobbies like that. But when I left Amazon, that was the thing that I had played tennis when I was growing up, but I was like, "I’m going to get back into it." Being on teams, getting to play competitive, well, old-age competitive tennis has been really fun.

Bob Smithhauser: You know, as you get older, pickleball seems to be the thing right now.

Jennifer Arthur: I know! I feel like I’m out of it because I don’t play. I can play pickleball and I do, but I haven’t played it as much recently.

Bob Smithhauser: Thank you, Little Bug, for your question.

Jesse Florea: So the movie, that’s what our listeners really want to know about, the movie *Journey into the Impossible*. It’s been in the works for years, so when you started at Focus, what was happening with the film? Had the movie even gotten the green light, as they say in Hollywood?

Jennifer Arthur: No, the film had not gotten the green light. They were still evaluating it, trying to figure out if we were going to do it, who would we work with for the animation, and what we were doing. When I was interviewing, my incoming boss told me that I was going to get to work on helping us make a decision if we were going to do the animation project. One of the very first things that I did, John Pomeroy, who is our art director for the movie, incredibly talented animator that we’re very blessed to have.

He had actually been talking with us, was super excited about what we were doing, and kept giving us all these names of people that we could work with. We kept coming back to, we actually think John is the right person for it. I ended up setting up a project with John for us to really understand what would it take in order for us to be able to do this film and is it feasible.

In the process, he brought on a group, Savannah, who is a production company that we work with, and Jamie Mitchell, who is our director, also incredibly talented. They had experience doing a lot of episodic work, so *Sofia the First* and *Fancy Nancy* were two of the big projects that they worked on, and both were long-run episodic series. All of a sudden, we had this incredible, talented pool of animators that were interested in the project.

They put together what it would take for us to do this. That was mostly just numbers. As we were talking through, they said, "Normally in a case like this, you would actually do what’s called a sizzle reel." And a sizzle reel’s really just a proof of concept. What does it look like? What is the animation going to look like? The sound? Can you tell the story some?

By this point, Dave Arnold already had a pretty good idea for the script. It was mostly done. We worked with them and we actually went to raise money to be able to do the sizzle reel. It was pretty miraculous. I look at this that I have seen God’s hand in this, but we went to raise the money, and when the window that we had to be able to raise it so that we would be able to produce the sizzle reel when the talent wasn’t working on other projects ended up being about two weeks. At 5:00 on the day that it was due, I got a text that we had just over the amount that we needed in order to produce the sizzle reel.

Then we went and produced the sizzle reel. Again, really talented group that we’re working with, and we presented it to the leadership team, and they approved. Then we started getting to move forward. That’s how the project came about.

Bob Smithhauser: One of the things we’ve always had an advantage, if you will, over the changes going on in the culture and the entertainment world with Odyssey is that audio doesn’t require as much of a budget. You can do a lot with audio to take the imagination places. When you’re trying to do all of that on a screen, whether it be television or movies, there are financial challenges. Movies are risky. They’re big. They’re just exhausting, especially for a ministry like ours. What tipped the scales? Why did Focus leadership decide this is the right time to move forward with an Odyssey movie?

Jennifer Arthur: First, as we all saw especially coming out of COVID, there was such an aggressive movement to bringing political agendas even into children’s content. Our ability as parents to have trustworthy content for our children was getting more and more limited. At the same time, studies actually show that the highest type or format of content that is consumed by actually every single generation that is alive today is video content.

We’ve got young people that are wanting to consume video content, but there is very little that their parents can actually trust for them to do. Knowing the impact and the opportunity that we have with *Adventures in Odyssey* and the fact that it is bringing everyday situations, answering tough and difficult questions, all with a biblical foundation, felt like a right opportunity for us to actually reach a new audience. To introduce them to Focus and bring them back to be able to also listen to the audio side and get them into the whole world of Odyssey. We want to provide safe content and introduce it to a new generation.

Jesse Florea: Which is exciting because we have almost 40 years of content with *Adventures in Odyssey* and some really strong fans. Fans who know us very well. This is going to be a new adventure, a prequel so to speak, kind of. I don’t want to give away too much. Our fans have already seen the sneak peek and are really excited about the movie just like I am. I don’t think I have a credit, but you have a credit! You’re a producer of the movie. I know producer can mean almost anything in Hollywood. There are executive producers, line producers, co-producers, associate producers, creative producers, supervising producers. It’s quite a list. So what does this mean, you being a producer?

Jennifer Arthur: I have to be honest, I have tried to get clarity on what the actual definition of a producer is, but you’re right, there’s so much, it’s confusing. I’ll just tell you what I’m doing on the film. Dave Arnold, of course, is the creative director. He wrote the script and he is the person who really knows *Adventures in Odyssey* and is making sure that everything we do is staying very true to *Adventures in Odyssey*. He brings in the creative from a voice perspective and everything.

I’m involved in that aspect of it, and every once in a while I do give my opinions, and sometimes they like them, sometimes they’re like, "Yeah, you are so not a creative person." But the other stuff that I do is really overseeing working with our production team, overseeing our budget, making sure that we are staying on budget with it. Working in hiring, I was involved with when we were finding voice talent, working with finding our marketing partners, working with finding the people who are going to help oversee the music.

We are working on seeing if there’s an opportunity for a soundtrack and so being involved with all of those pieces. It’s more the business side of just working with all of our partners and making sure that we’re staying on schedule, making sure that we are driving the project forward in the right way, making the tough calls on things we will and will not do to be able to ensure that we deliver the best experience for the team.

Bob Smithhauser: We’re not creating this movie, Jennifer, to make money so much. We’d rather not lose money either. Clearly you’re a numbers person and this is important to you. Ultimately we’re doing this to make an impact. Unpack the ministry aspect of the film. When you think about the heart of this film, what do you hope happens inside someone who watches it?

Jennifer Arthur: I think the film does a really beautiful job of bringing exciting adventure, but also showing everyday situations. Making friends, adjusting to new places, and trusting God through those things that are so hard that we can't necessarily work through it fully on our own, and being able to actually rely on God.

Two-fold, for those people who come and watch that are believers, being able to see these circumstances that the family is dealing with and just kind of seeing how they do trust God so that in our heart as we’re watching it, it just reminds us that we should be and we can turn to God. And I think for hopefully we get a lot of people who might not know the Lord yet, but are coming for an exciting adventure and getting to have that opportunity of just seeing a family living out their faith.

It’s not a judgmental thing, it’s not a you-have-to-be-this-certain-piety. It’s just this family, the Whitakers are so amazing in how God is just at the center of how they live. Being able to see that and get exposure to who our God is, that you can be a family that is living and walking through life just like everyone else, but having God at the center and being able to open their hearts to God and want to know him more.

Jesse Florea: And the actors who are playing the Whitakers, I mean, are just amazing with lines and lines of amazing credits. They do, they bring those characters to life so well. I’m super excited about this movie. Jennifer, how do you think this movie is different than anything else people will see in theaters this year?

Jennifer Arthur: The interesting thing is there are so many animation movies coming out this year. Over Christmas, I had taken my kids to watch the cartoon *Grinch* at the theaters because they had a special showing in the theaters. All of these films every single month, there is a different animation film. A lot of them are animals. You’ve got *Toy Story 5* and *Mario Brothers*, which is related to obviously the video games. A lot of them look fantastic.

But I would say this is the one that is coming out that has a faith component to it, but is a faith component with people that are living everyday lives like we do today. There’s some really obviously *David* just came out this last Christmas, and there are other Christian animation series out there, but a lot of them are biblical, which is awesome and I’m thrilled to see how much people are going to that. But this is something that brings that everyday experience.

The adventure within it, it has a good throwback as a fan of some of the different films that also inspired it. You can see a very cool different type of adventure than they’re going to have in other films. For people who knew *Goonies* and *A Wrinkle in Time* and even *National Treasure*, as you’re watching the movie you can see some of the inspiration from those. If that gives you a hint of where it could be going.

Bob Smithhauser: We’ve got a bunch of months between now and when the movie actually comes out, and Jesse and I have not seen anything more than our fans have. This is a question from us as much as on behalf of the fans, and that is, when will we get to see a full trailer? When will we get to see more to get us more excited about what’s happening in the fall?

Jennifer Arthur: We’re still finalizing the timing, but I would say probably mid-spring, April-May time frame, we’ll probably have our full trailer.

Bob Smithhauser: Well I can say on behalf of the folks that are commenting in the club and on social media, we are all very excited to see what’s next. Thank you for being with us today.

Jennifer Arthur: Of course. I’m delighted to get to share. It’s an exciting project.

Jesse Florea: We can’t wait to have you back in studio, maybe closer to the release or after the release to talk about what’s next in the world of Odyssey.

Jennifer Arthur: Absolutely. Would love to come back again.

Jesse Florea: I love hearing how much thought and care has gone into every part of this movie.

Bob Smithhauser: Yes, and I also appreciate how intentional the team has been about protecting the heart of *Adventures in Odyssey* while also telling a story on a much bigger canvas. We’ll be sharing more about the movie in the months ahead. But in the meantime, you can find behind-the-scenes videos and more at odysseystudioinsiders.com.

Club members can already log in, but if you aren’t a club member, you can still create an account for free. And don’t forget that Album 80, *Re-Written*, is available in the club and on download now, coming to CD and the radio in March. More details at adventuresinodyssey.com. That’s all for this edition of the official *Adventures in Odyssey* podcast, a presentation of Focus on the Family. If you or your family need to talk to someone, you can always call 1-800-A-FAMILY.

Jesse Florea: Or you can find us online at adventuresinodyssey.com. I’m Jesse.

Bob Smithhauser: I’m Bob.

Jesse Florea: Reminding you that with God in your life, every day’s an adventure.

Guest (Male): Live your truth. A lot of people say that, don’t they? But truth isn't something we decide. God has decided it for us, and it's our job as believers to share his truth with a world in need. I'll encourage you to do that through my podcast, *Refocus with Jim Daly*. I visit with fascinating guests about important topics like gender confusion, cancel culture, and more, while helping you share God's love with others. Listen at refocuswithjimdaly.com.