Shit Girls Say goes from Twitter to TIFF
TORONTO (CUP) Despite the
fact that his video has been viewed
over 30 million times on YouTube,
Graydon Sheppard is not easily distinguishable
from the teeming
crowds of his hometown, Toronto.
Sheppard looks simply "like a boy,"
he says with a laugh. A scruffy
beard and short messy hair make up
his everyday look but, on camera, he
stands out as ditzy brunette girl, star
of the viral video Shit Girls Say.
Dressed in drag and a long brown wig, 29-year-old Sheppard squeals nuanced catchphrases, uttered often by members of the fairer sex. "Do you want to split a cookie?" "Do you know anything about computers?"
Despite his knack for one-liners, Sheppard and his partner Kyle Humphrey are no one-hit wonders. The fourth and final installment of their Shit Girls Say video franchise was viewed by more than online comedy lovers — it was a feature video of the Short Cuts Canada program at this year's Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).
Unlike the over-the-top lead character from Shit Girls Say, Sheppard is soft-spoken and shy when speaking from his ninth floor room in the Ace Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. After graduating from Ryerson's photography program in 2005, he has been directing regularly, heading up all kinds of projects from commercials to music videos. He also did the graphic design for Feist's 2011 album Metals.
A fun little side project and a few simple tweets starting in April 2011 put him on another tangent. He and Humphrey started the Twitter account @shitgirlssay. Promoting it through his contacts in film and music, they quickly garnered a following that now exceeds 1.6 million.
"Cameron Bailey, TIFF's artistic director, had followed Shit Girls Say on Twitter," Sheppard said. "At one point, someone sent us a tweet that he had written saying, 'hope someone is making this into a movie.'" Little did Bailey know that the films were already in the works, and that actress Juliette Lewis, perhaps best known for playing alongside Woody Harrelson in Natural Born Killers, had already filmed a cameo appearance for the Shit Girls Say videos.
Once the webisodes were released online, Sheppard and Humphrey were asked to submit videos for Packaged Goods, a showcase for short filmmaking at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. The pair credited the smart use of social media, namely Twitter and YouTube, for elevating their web videos into mainstream conversations. Countless variations of the meme have also struck niche audiences, but the original has brought Sheppard and Humphrey to the next level.
Having TIFF on your resume is a huge push for any young filmmaker.
"It gives you that cachet so you can be recognized and make more films," Sheppard said. It is also a big boost when asking for grants, like those used toward the development of the newly released Shit Girls Say book.
Though Shit Girls Say has quickly grown from Twitter and YouTube to theatres and bookstores, Sheppard isn't worried about being typecast in the same role or cornered in one-line comedy writing.
"I'm not pigeonholed," he said. "More opportunities are coming up than ever before."
Dressed in drag and a long brown wig, 29-year-old Sheppard squeals nuanced catchphrases, uttered often by members of the fairer sex. "Do you want to split a cookie?" "Do you know anything about computers?"
Despite his knack for one-liners, Sheppard and his partner Kyle Humphrey are no one-hit wonders. The fourth and final installment of their Shit Girls Say video franchise was viewed by more than online comedy lovers — it was a feature video of the Short Cuts Canada program at this year's Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).
Unlike the over-the-top lead character from Shit Girls Say, Sheppard is soft-spoken and shy when speaking from his ninth floor room in the Ace Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. After graduating from Ryerson's photography program in 2005, he has been directing regularly, heading up all kinds of projects from commercials to music videos. He also did the graphic design for Feist's 2011 album Metals.
A fun little side project and a few simple tweets starting in April 2011 put him on another tangent. He and Humphrey started the Twitter account @shitgirlssay. Promoting it through his contacts in film and music, they quickly garnered a following that now exceeds 1.6 million.
"Cameron Bailey, TIFF's artistic director, had followed Shit Girls Say on Twitter," Sheppard said. "At one point, someone sent us a tweet that he had written saying, 'hope someone is making this into a movie.'" Little did Bailey know that the films were already in the works, and that actress Juliette Lewis, perhaps best known for playing alongside Woody Harrelson in Natural Born Killers, had already filmed a cameo appearance for the Shit Girls Say videos.
Once the webisodes were released online, Sheppard and Humphrey were asked to submit videos for Packaged Goods, a showcase for short filmmaking at the TIFF Bell Lightbox. The pair credited the smart use of social media, namely Twitter and YouTube, for elevating their web videos into mainstream conversations. Countless variations of the meme have also struck niche audiences, but the original has brought Sheppard and Humphrey to the next level.
Having TIFF on your resume is a huge push for any young filmmaker.
"It gives you that cachet so you can be recognized and make more films," Sheppard said. It is also a big boost when asking for grants, like those used toward the development of the newly released Shit Girls Say book.
Though Shit Girls Say has quickly grown from Twitter and YouTube to theatres and bookstores, Sheppard isn't worried about being typecast in the same role or cornered in one-line comedy writing.
"I'm not pigeonholed," he said. "More opportunities are coming up than ever before."
