I love mock-infomercials. Like, love more than Billy Mays is excited. Broomshakalaka and similar adult swim shorts were my life blood in Los Angeles, and my art scene there was just as obssessed with hyper-consumerism and grotesque capitalism as I was. In one of the last shows our performing arts collective, Sokamba, did, some friends and I had a piece called “Modern Circus” which was a hellish 15 minute exercise in over-stimulation. I got to be the living manifestation of infomercials, Mr. Snuggie, and I juggled knives, blended glow sticks onto the front row, and then was crucified. It was so fun. I’ll have to find a picture or video somewhere…
I’m really excited about this group project — it was super fun to brainstorm and develop the concept, and it really feels like everyone is super on board for our idea. Here’s the synopsis:
Synopsis
An infomercial spokesman takes us on a journey to find love in the modern world. He begins by introducing us to an enchanting necklace sure to lead buyers to the person of their dreams. During the next infomercial, he presents an automated pheremone spritzer for your home, but something seems a little off about him -- his heart’s not in it, you could say. The third infomercial starts and he begins to show off a sexy wig, but he’s clearly having some sort of breakdown. The producer tries to get him to continue filming, but the spokeman’s a wreck. Finally, he rips off the mic and runs off the sound stage. The producer and camera crew scramble to follow him as he frantically searches the manic streets for something. Eventually, he finds his ex-lover and pours his heart out, confessing his love for her and pleads for her to take him back. She apologizes, and turns to her new lover — the brand’s new spokesman, touting all the previous three products and confidently addressing the camera to introduce the fourth.
I was also pleasantly surprised by my group’s dedication to using the google doc story outline I had set up. I feel like in past group projects in my life, I would spend a lot of time making an extensive google doc so all collaborators would be able to contribute in one local, comprehensive spot, but I would be the only one to use it. With this group, everyone has been commenting, adding, highlighting, inserting pictures — it’s been a type-A dream come true. Here’s the Story Overview Doc:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/12JyjhN4vUo9ulfVs3WjwmeUW_1X62oeRkCR1i-X9H9E/edit?usp=drivesdk
We’re still working on getting all the storyboard slides together, but it feels like we’re really coming along in the process. We have basically every scene fleshed out minus the dialogue and product specifics — now we just need to draw straws to see who’s going to act in it haha. I'm not sure if it’ll be useful or not, but I’m hoping to draft a screenplay for this as well. I haven’t written in screenplay format since my screenwriting program in undergrad, so I’m itching to exercise those atrophied muscles. Maybe it’ll encourage me to get back to my dusty-shelved third feature…