Get to know the Top Sportsman

Flow Staters:

My favorite thing this week has got to be "Top Sportsman," a fun new short written and directed by Oliver Sutro. It tells the story of Captain Dick Fisher, a mixed up young fella with a fishing show who heads out onto the flats seeking glory and a connection to the past. What does he find? Well, I won't spoil it.

From its MIDI-tastic '90s soundtrack, to the bodacious costume choices (check those cuffed white shorts), to the brassy and cavalier voiceover copy—read by none other than O.G. fishing show icon himself Flip Pallott, who passed away last summer—"Top Sportsman" is both parody and sweet homage to the heyday of fishing TV and the seminal Walker's Cay Chronicles.

I caught up with Sutro, an accomplished photographer as well as a filmmaker, on his way to a shoot in Vermont with Olympian Ben Ogden. Turns out "Top Sportsman" in its final form spent over five years in various stages of development, and nearly didn't make it to daylight. Read on for the whole story...

Hey Oliver! What made you want to do this? Where did the idea come from?

I'm always thinking "Oh, it'd be fun to make a dumb, funny video," and Dylan Schmitz and I had been tarpon fishing together. He had thought it'd be fun to make a reference to Tarpon, so he produced this whole thing, got the funding to shoot it, and that's where we started. "Wouldn't it be funny to make a silly retro-inspired tarpon fishing film, where everything was vintage?"

Dylan went to a museum, or some old guy who was a collector, and we got all this vintage tackle. We found a guy with a boat who had a vintage teak deck who looked the part, and we dressed up Bennett [Hrabovsky, as Captain Dick, who also starred in Sutro's 2021 production "One Man's Trash"] and Rudy Babikian [the cameraman] as best we could. Rudy, he's an obsessive fly fisherman, he's a serious saltwater fly angler, and he was just there fishing with Dylan the week before we shot this, and he said he'd be game to do this and didn't know what he signed up for.

You said Tarpon was a touchpoint, but obviously the "Walker's Cay Chronicles" TV show is a big reference as well.

Dylan had been thinking Tarpon, I've honestly never seen Tarpon, but when I was studying to write this, I'd just come off shooting Flip for TFO, and thought, this guy was magical. He speaks in poetry. I was blown away. They just went in so hard on that TV show with everything. Every single part of it was so incredibly thoughtful. It has this beautiful style from the time that didn't feel tacky. The animated opening sequence, it has some graphics, some superimposed images. Back in the day that would have been really difficult. They had underwater shots. And they did it all on film! I talked to Flip about the production, trying to reference the cameras. I think they shot it on 16mm. Having shot in Florida before, I was blown away that people were out there in the middle of nowhere, saltwater splashing everywhere, in the blazing heat, loading film.

How did Flip come to do the voiceover?

We shot the film in 2021; All Hands, the sponsor, saw the film internally and thought "this is great, we want to make a series," but the film was never approved. They didn't want to release it. So it almost died. Fast forward to 2023. At that time I had an assistant, Freddie Gluck, who took a look at all this footage that had been sitting, and he came back to me and said "This is the best, but I want to make these changes." Freddie edited it, made a few cuts, and gave it new life. And I thought "We should finish this."

We talked to Andy Mill about his experience. We asked Andy if he would voice it, and he said no. But only because I was too nervous to ask Flip to do it it. I thought, "I should get the license for the music, and I should get over my fear and ask Flip to narrate it." I wrote all the voiceover myself, I sent it to Flip, and he agreed to it. I sent him the copy. He had his own audio equipment and he did it in one take—one read all the way through—and it was just perfect. It was pretty cool seeing that, and thinking of all the voiceovers he's recorded over all those years, that this one was just a drop in the bucket.

Were you worried he would feel like you were mocking Walker's?

I think he really enjoyed it. He said it was funny, and I don't think he would have done it if he though it was really bad. I think in the fishing world your serious foot gets put forward first. But then when you go hang out with someone and sit in a boat for the day you realize we all love to laugh and hang out and bullshit. Flip was no exception, he was an incredibly funny guy.

Do you think fly fishing filmmaking more broadly takes itself too seriously?

Yeah. I think it's hard to get distribution for a film if it fits in a different category. We all see the archetype: Serious anglers, traveling to the ends of the earth to chase these giant fish, and along the way they save a community. No one ever sees any comedy films making it. And I know I'm not the only one to have made a comedy film and have it rejected. These sorts of serious film festivals don't reward comedy. It's one of the greatest joys in life, laughing together with people. In the fishing world it might have to do with sponsorship? They want to show hardcore gear. But there's room for comedy, it's just slightly riskier.

Thanks Oliver! You can follow Oliver on YouTube and Instagram to see more of his films. And just because it's still the sickest, and still sends chills down my spine, here's the original intro to the Walker's Cay Chronicles. For more Walker's, uou can find a great spread of episodes on Flip Pallott's YouTube.

Leaders ➰

Ten fishy links to start your week on the fly side of life

Spring: The Best Season for Trout Fishing (6 min read)

There's probably a good content strategy in writing articles entitled "... is the best season" but I agree with Miles Nolte: Spring is King. Bugs are prolific, fish are waking up, and you don't have to worry about crowds. (skwalafishing.com)

Can Fishing Save the World? (2 min read)

Betteridge's Law of Headlines states that when a headline asks a question, the answer is almost always "no." But I'm willing to give William Robichaud at Tenkara Angler a pass here, as he tells the story of a chance encounter in the Driftless and the hope it raises in him. (tenkaraangler.com)

How I organize my fly tying materials (2 min read)

Count CFS pal Chuck G in the "categories" camp of fly tying material organizers. For the record, the materials organization styles I've clocked are by Category, Pattern, and Chaos, the latter being the frequent domain of those who tie in their rig. (cagrimmett.com)

Gotta love a fish that sings the blues! (3 min read)

Herring were spawning this week in Oregon's Yaquina Bay, sending such an incredible volume of eggs and milt into the water that it turned a bright turquoise. Photographer Brian Stone captured the bay's remarkable transformation. (theguidesforecast.com)

Only a dignified Michelle Pfeiffer saves this dreary Taylor Sheridan mess (2 min read)

Aussie TV critic Craig Mathieson holds nothing back in labeling the new fly-adjacent Taylor Sheridan product The Madison unsubtle and zealous. I'll still fast forward through it to critique everyone's casting, though.
(theage.com.au)

Big Sky Country Snowpack Report - March, 2026 (2 min read)

Well, it ain't near good enough, but some bright spots exist. The last snowpack report of the year from Big Sky Anglers highlights Montana's place as the best of the worst Western states in terms of this year's pathetic winter snowpack. (bigskyanglers.com)

OWA's hiring an intern (2-min read)

The Outdoor Writers Association of America, of which I count myself a proud member, is hiring a summer intern to help manage social media promotions around it's 100th anniversary. Do you know anyone who might fit the bill? (owa.org)

Opposition to data centers is growing. How far can it go? (Deep dive)

Columbia Insight editor Chuck Thompson looks at the grassroots efforts to push back against data center construction and consumption in Oregon, calling into question its impact on water and power resources and asking important questions about who is benefitting from subsides. (columbiainsight.org)

America’s Most Endangered Public Lands 2026 (Deep dive)

Stephanie Pearson at RE:PUBLIC details the biggest threats to public lands in America, which are disappearing at a rate of four acres per minute. From ravenous Burmese Pythons in southern Florida to threats of mining and drilling in the Boundary Waters and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the ten most acute challenges loom large, with a malignant administration aiming at wholesale asset stripping making changes on paper just as quickly. (republic.land)

Government to lift paywall from large parts of the Land Registry (3 min read)

Over 50% of the land in England is owned by under 1% of the population, and it's previously been a clumsy and expensive process to find out who. With a new land use framework aimed at a more holistic management process balancing agriculture, restoration, and sustainable energy, Fiona Harvey details how the island is taking a step toward transparency. (theguardian.com)

Join us in Maupin this May!

Register for the Maupin Meetup!
The salmonfly hatch and all the beauty of late spring in the high desert will be upon us soon. Join CFS May 28-31 in Maupin, Oregon, for some classic big bug fishing and the DRA's TroutFest celebration.

Get in there!

Events 📆

Got an event you want the community to know about? Send it over, and I'll include it here. You can see all of our upcoming CFS events on Luma.

March 25, Charleston, SC
Don of fly fishing media Kirk Deeter will be in conversation with Garden & Gun EIC David DiBenedetto, as Deeter presents his new work on culinary-angling mashups, co-authored with Matthew Supinski, A Fishable Feast. (Ladybird Books)

NEW: March 31, Santa Barbara, CA
Actor Tom Skerritt, author John Maclean, Trout Unlimited CEO Chris Wood, and others gather on a panel to discuss the movie's impact, and more. (Lobero Theater)

April 24-25, Gresham, OR
Sandy River Spey Clave (Sandy River Spey Clave)

April 25, Vida, OR
The Wooden Boat Show on the McKenzie River (The Redsides)

April 30, "Running Wild" Tour, Seattle
(Wild Salmon Center)

CFS: May 16, OR
Waterside fly tying and fishing field trip; more details to come.

May 20, Portland, OR
"Running Wild" showing (Wild Salmon Center)

CFS: May 28-31, Maupin, OR
It's our annual Maupin Meetup! Registered now, before it fills up. (CFS Events)

June 23, "Running Wild" Tour, San Francisco
(Wild Salmon Center)

June 26-28, La Pine, OR
Tenkara Oregon's Tenkara Bugout (Tenkara Oregon)

That's it that's all! Current Flow State is a weekly newsletter from me, Nick Parish.

Did a mysterious stranger ever hand you a magic fly on a Florida pier? Tell me on Bluesky 🦋, Instagram 📸, YouTube 🎥, or the Fishcord 💬. (Please don't say "your mom.")

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