What Meta Is Doing at Cannes Film Festival and Why YouTube Is No Joke for Comedians

0:00Jasmine Enberg: Hi, everyone. This is Scalable, a weekly show about the business of the creator economy. I'm Kaya Yurieff. And I'm Jasmine Enberg. Every Thursday, we take you beyond the headlines to tell you what's happening, what it means, and why it matters. Is Instagram going to start making movies? And will we see more creator movies like MarketPlier's Iron Lung? Plus, how stand-up comedy is changed by social media. We dive into these stories in today's episode. And we give you our on-the-ground takeaways from the Cannes Film Festival.

0:31Jasmine Enberg: Hi, Jasmine. Hey, Kaya. And hi, everyone. Thank you so much for tuning into our weekly show about the creator economy. Okay, Jasmine, are you recovered from your 16-hour travel journey back from Temple Festival? I am so tired. I don't know how you do it. I woke up at 4.30 this morning, so the jet lag is absolutely killing me. And I cannot believe I will be doing it again in about three weeks, going back to the same place for Cannes Lions. Although, you know, how amazing is it that we get to go to the south of France so many times? And it's kind of wild that, you know, it's become the number one place we go on business trips now.

1:08Jasmine Enberg: It's wild, but I'm definitely not complaining either. I will say I packed completely wrong for this trip. Like everything I packed was wrong. I was expecting warmer weather, which we did get over the weekend, which was amazing. But yeah, not a single thing was the right thing to pack. I packed completely wrong too. I also expected the dress code to be much fancier. I mean, the way people described it to me, it sounded like everybody basically woke up wearing black tie, which was not the case at all. But now we know. And for next time, if we get invited back, we'll know what to bring. Yeah, I was expecting in general Cannes to be much busier.

1:42Jasmine Enberg: But of course, it's such an exclusive festival. And it's a very expensive place to go on vacation to just willy-nilly want to see the film festival. It's also not really vacation time yet. It's mid-May. It's true, but like restaurants were empty. Like it wasn't really, but like at the red carpet moments, people were kind of crowding around to catch a glimpse. But anyway, next year we have to get on the red carpet. We could see it from afar, which was a very cool experience. Though we didn't really have that many celebrity sightings, unfortunately. Though John Travolta was there and Demi Moore, to name a few.

2:16We did see Marianne Clotillard though, who I love. She's a French actress. But anyway, you are all probably wondering what we were doing at the Cannes Film Festival, which is a very fair question. You're probably also wondering what Meta was doing there, which is another fair question. And we asked him about that too, specifically whether it meant that Instagram was going to start making movies now. We'll give you the answer in just a moment, but first a message from our sponsor.

2:39Jasmine Enberg: Sports marketing is changing faster than ever. How can brands keep up? That's where the first ever Lions Sport program comes in. Taking place from June 24th to the 25th, Lions Sport is your opportunity to hear from the brands innovating in the space, including Strava, Hero Esports, Twitch, and more, and connect with the leaders redefining sports marketing. Apply now at canlions.com to be in the room with these sports marketing leaders. Okay, so we were so excited and honestly honored and very shocked to get the call to be part of the first ever Creator Economy Summit at the Marché du Film. That is the annual film market and business conference that happens alongside the Cannes Film Festival.

3:17For those of who might not be as familiar with the film festival, it is considered the pinnacle of prestige in the film industry. I mean, winning a Palme d 'Or is arguably the highest honor, probably even higher than an Oscar, especially for independent cinema.

3:31Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, and that was definitely the vibe of the festival. Unsurprisingly, extreme prestige, very exclusive. We got very lucky and we made it into a screening, which was very busy. We tried to go to the earlier screening and the theater was full, but we made it to the 1030, which was a little past her bedtime, but we made it work. We were also wearing stiletto heels, or at least I was because I thought we needed to do that for the screening, which we later found out was only necessary on the red carpet. But that's an aside. It's fine. We're ready for next year. So we got to see Fatherland, a film about the Cold War, which was great.

4:01Jasmine Enberg: And from a famous Polish director, Pawel Pawlikowski. So that was very fun for me. But there was no Polish in the film. There was no Polish. Which I was shocked at. Yeah. Not a single word. A lot of it is French too. Yeah. But yeah, anyway, as you said, we learned the hard way that for any of the major premieres, you need an invitation and you do absolutely have to be in black tie. So that's right. But not for the other screenings. People were in like outfits that really ran the gamut. Yeah. I mean, I think overall, I was expecting it to be exclusive, but I think the seriousness of the event still surprised me.

4:35And I think part of that is because I've been comparing it to Cannes Lions, which is just a totally different vibe. It's like a party from morning to night. And it's like super busy and you know all of the the beach restaurants are taken over by big platforms and agencies but I was also struck by a couple of other things at the film festival one was the people who were waiting in tuxes and gowns outside of the red carpet and holding up signs like literally begging for tickets like that was wild to me and something I was not expecting to see and the second thing was the size of the red carpet like it was much smaller than what I had seen on TV.

5:10And it kind of reminded me of when we went to the Senate floor in February. And that also looked a lot smaller than what I had seen on TV. I was also super surprised at how few Americans were there this year. It was very European, obviously a lot of French people. But I also heard so much Finnish while we were walking around. And I had an old friend from Finland actually who we ran into on the street. And a big part of that has to do with the fact that many of the Hollywood studios weren't there this year. And it was so fun to kind of get the tea from people on the ground, including some of them who'd been going there for decades about why that was.

5:43Jasmine Enberg: Yes, and we'll tell you what we heard later on in the show. We'll also share what we learned about the selection process, why some films don't enter into the competition. It's a lot more complicated than you might think. Plus, some creator movies saw big wins coming out of Cannes this year, but not in the way you might expect. We will also discuss this later in the episode. Finally, we'll be joined by Scott Dunn, co-founder of Unicorn and a good friend of both of ours. Unicorn is a new kind of talent management firm that's building new shows and other types of IP with creators, and we dive deep into how social media has changed comedy.

6:13Let's start with why Meta was at the Cannes Film Festival, because on the surface, it doesn't really seem to make sense.

6:20Jasmine Enberg: When we were asked to moderate a session with Meta, we were very curious if this meant that Meta was suddenly going to get into the film industry and start making movies. We've seen the convergence of streaming and TV with creators, but we're really just the beginning of the film industry intersecting with the creator economy. And since Instagram now has a TV app in the US, we had to ask the question to Louise Holmes, director of creator and media partnerships at Meta on stage. To spoil things, no, Meta is not getting into the movie business. It is not going to be commissioning films. Instead, Meta was there because they see their tools as supporting the film industry.

6:53And because the Cannes Film Festival is a big moment on its apps. It's true. Did you kind of see the reel of Scarlett Johansson not picking up the FaceTime call during the standing ovation for Paper Tiger when the director called her.

7:06Jasmine Enberg: I know, and everyone was kind of dunking on her on Instagram, but she's filming a different movie, so she apparently was on set and busy. That context was not given. Obviously not. Here's Louise, who explains why Meta wanted to be there. Cannes is an iconic cultural moment. It's where the world's cinematic stories are born, and Meta really is the home of global cultural conversations. We have over 3.5 billion users on our apps on a daily basis. And that means that those audiences, those viewers on our apps have a front row seat at a cultural event like Cannes. And we're constantly developing tools for filmmakers, for producers, for content creators to help them bring their artistic vision to life.

7:53Jasmine Enberg: Also, there was an opportunity for Meta to come in. TikTok has been the official social media sponsor for the past few years, and now Meta has the spot. TikTok, YouTube, and Meta have been inviting creators over the past few years to walk the red carpet at the film festival, interview talent, cover the event. But a big difference this year is that the festival allowed creators to wear Meta Ray-Bans on the red carpet to capture content. Normally, no devices or phones are allowed. It's really just professional cameras. It's a super controlled environment. Yeah, and that might not seem like a big deal, but it is a huge concession for the film festival, which is now in its 79th year, it has intentionally tried to sort of keep the tradition and the prestige alive.

8:31And that applies to, you know, the dress code as well as the devices. So it is also super strict on what you're allowed to wear on the red carpet. So no long trains for dresses, for example, no nudity, which I think is a good rule, honestly. no sneakers and also no other shoes that aren't quote elegant and Halle Berry for example had to change last year because a train on her dress was too long I mean I think that says a lot about the film festival too that she actually did that right I mean clearly there's a lot of respect for this as an institution and that she had a backup dress like she had a backup so quickly she packs better than we did this year clearly although i don't think she was responsible for her own packing maybe one day we'll get to that level and then in 2015 women were apparently denied entry to the red carpet for wearing flat shoes and that sparked so much controversy as well as people showing up in the following years barefoot in protest of it all i mean look i get not wanting

9:34Jasmine Enberg: like a jennifer lawrence and flip-flops or people not being barefoot but like but to jennifer lawrence's credit. Her shoes that she was supposed to wear supposedly were a size too big and she did not want to trip up the stairs. So I get it. I mean, I wouldn't, I don't think necessarily think flip flops are acceptable on the red carpet either, but I don't know. I wouldn't want to trip. And she's notorious for tripping. Halle Berry has a backup dress and Jennifer Lawrence doesn't have other shoes besides flip flops. Very fair point. Okay. But anyway, but why not allow a dramatic train? Like that's what red carpets are all about.

10:05Jasmine Enberg: Although I guess seeing how relatively, I know, I was going to say. There's not enough room. Okay, seeing it now, I guess it makes sense. Back to Meta and TikTok, what we're really talking about. I would actually love to ask TikTok why it didn't return as a sponsor for the film festival this year. I mean, obviously, there has been so much going on with its business, but you also have to wonder if the ROI was there. It's also a really interesting moment for Meta to be coming on as the official sponsor of the film festival, given all the debate around AI. films that were quote primarily driven by generative ai cannot compete for the highest prize which is the palm to or while that is not an outright ban on using the technology it is still a stance against ai and then you have meta i mean meta is planning to spend up to 145 billion dollars on ai in 2026 and for a little bit of context that is more than two-thirds of the company's revenue in 2025.

10:59That's crazy. Let's not sink in for a second. I know, I'll give it a little pause. But anyway, so it does feel at odds that the film festival is saying that films that have used generative AI cannot compete, but then they're willing to take money from one of the biggest AI spenders in the world.

11:18Jasmine Enberg: It's almost like they want to have their cake and eat it too. Cannes film festival is not the only one to put in rules like this. So the Academy Awards recently sent something similar. The acting and writing must be done by humans in order to be eligible for an Oscar. On the topic of Meta's AI tools, though, the moment was also fitting for them to be a sponsor this year because one of the films that premiered at the festival actually was made using Meta AI in some cases. So Meta was a technology partner for Steven Soderbergh's film, John Lennon, The Last Interview. And what's so interesting and probably very intentional is that Soderbergh didn't use AI to replicate Lennon or Yoko Ono or any other living person, but instead used it to illustrate what Lennon was describing.

11:55Jasmine Enberg: Here's what Louise from Meta said about that. It's actually a radio interview between John Lennon and Yoko Ono, taken hours before his life ended tragically. And what Steven Soderbergh has done is used Meta AI's technology to bring that conversation, which is essentially an audio track, to life by using AI to cinematically interpret John Onoko's words and give it a creative imagery and storytelling. So I think it's a fabulous example of where AI really is the tool. It's absolutely Soderbergh's vision and creativity at the forefront. And the AI technology just enables that vision to come to life.

12:34Okay, so this is also a perfect segue into how the film festival actually is organized, because it is so complicated. I still am having trouble wrapping my head around it, even though we picked like so many people's brains about this. But so Soderbergh's film was part of the official selection at Cannes, but it was not part of the competition. That's at least in part because of the use of AI. There were also a lot of other films like that there, meaning that they were premiering or being shown at Cannes, but they weren't competing. There's also several parallel sections to sort of the main festival and the movies that are premiering in the main theaters like Critics Week and Directors' Fortnite.

13:10And these feature a bunch of other films. One of them was Atonement, which was super buzzy at the festival and not the 2007 movie with Keira Knightley like I originally thought it was.

13:22Jasmine Enberg: important disclaimer for our listeners. I don't think anybody else made that mistake. Who knows? But yeah, most of these movies are very art house, indie or foreign, though there historically have been a lot of Hollywood premieres at Cannes as well. This year was different. What we heard is that Hollywood studios decided not to come to Cannes because it's expensive and risky. According to one longtime attendee, it can cost upwards of a million dollars to premiere at Cannes. And if you get a bad review, then you risk the premiere on the box office too. Yeah, I mean, it makes total sense. The critics at Cannes are notorious for being kind of savage, pretty brutal.

13:54And studios are strapped for cash and they're not going to essentially want to pay for a bad review, especially if it ruins their chances in the box office, to your point, Kaya. And the box office has improved, but it's definitely not anywhere near where it used to be. I mean, a lot of people point to the box office mojo stat that we pointed to before as well. It does show somewhat of a recovery because it has been the strongest start to the year since the pandemic with roughly$2 billion in ticket sales. But what's missing from that is that a lot of the growth in ticket sales also has to do with inflation and rising prices.

14:27And I actually said this at Cannes to someone on the ground who was like, you're not allowed to say that it is taboo.

14:32Jasmine Enberg: I mean, it's a tough time and people are touchy, but it is true, right? Like, and we also learned that in Europe, they measure admissions, which like so practical to Europeans. So that makes perfect sense instead of dollar amounts, which hello, change as the years go on. And also like you have to be realistic or nothing is going to change. Okay, but this does all tie into creators. So Jordan Firstman, who you may know for his hilarious impressions during the pandemic on Instagram. So before he blew up on Instagram, he's been an actor, TV writer, but Instagram definitely put him kind of more into the mainstream.

15:05Jasmine Enberg: So his dramedy Club Kid, which was an official selection and premiere, though it wasn't part of the official competition again. But anyway, either way, it had a$17 million global rights deal from A24. So huge win for him. And then there was also a French creator named Seb, who also launched a feature documentary during the Cannes Film Festival. Still, again, these weren't up for, you know, awards or they weren't part of the competition. But, you know, still, you can see the prestige of being associated and having that moment at Cannes for these creators. Yeah. And Seb was actually one of the creators on stage at the Creator Economy Summit, which also featured Markiplier, who recently grossed$50 million for his movie Iron Lung.

15:42Also breaking news, Markiplier said on stage that the movie is going to be available for purchase on May 31st on YouTube. It's an exclusive release, meaning that it's not going to be available anywhere else. I am in the Cannes Film Festival. I am there for one day. I left in the morning and I arrived the day of the event that I'm supposed to be on a panel of, with which YouTube invited me to, and also MK2, who helped with the European distribution of Iron Lung. And I am there to talk about my experiences with the movie and also give you a release date for when the movie is going to be available for digital purchase and rent.

16:19And as a side note, because we do have to take a moment to acknowledge when we got something right. And we have been making the case for YouTube to bring back original or exclusive content. And MarketPlier is not the only one to have an exclusive deal with YouTube now. So at brand cost last week, YouTube unveiled a bunch of new exclusive shows from creators, including Jesser, Alex Cooper, and Dude Perfect. It is a different approach from YouTube Originals, which of course the company shuttered back in 2022. Instead of funding these shows, YouTube is now promoting that content because these creators are already producing it themselves.

16:53But the end result is the same. I mean, YouTube now has a slate of premium vetted shows that it can pitch to advertisers. And like we've been arguing, that's exactly what it needs if it wants to start truly siphoning TV ad dollars.

17:07Jasmine Enberg: Yes, we'll dive deeper into the YouTube of it all with Scott Dunn from Unicorn later in the episode. But keeping on creators at Cannes, Metta also invited a bunch of European creators to the festival, as well as Rhys Feldman, who's based in New York. And he's known online as Guy with a Movie Camera. On Instagram, he has about 600 ,000 followers. And this was actually his fourth time at Cannes Film Festival. And he's also been to many other red carpets, including the Oscars. If you don't know, Reese, Time Magazine called him Gen Z's movie whisperer. And he got his start by showing the behind the scenes of working on set as a production assistant, including on Amazon's The Marvelous Mrs.

17:42Jasmine Enberg: Maisel and Operation Awesome, which is a reality TV series from BYU TV, which is a Mormon network. He's a film student who has always loved movies. And here's Reese on what some of his early videos look like. We got to chat with him and Kim. So I was doing everything. You know, I was learning the ropes in real time. and it was incredible. And I started recording myself, filling up gas in the car, getting coffee at six in the morning, setting up lunches, building tents, moving sandbags. And mostly with the goal of just being like, hey, I didn't realize this was a thing. And I wanted to explain to my friends that like I'm working on set, but I'm taking out the trash.

18:20And I wanted to share that. Fast forward and Reese is getting invited by the Academy to be on the Oscars red carpet and by TikTok and now Meta to be at Cannes. I've done a lot of red carpets in the past few years, like more than I can count, which is really cool. But also it's like it doesn't it's not necessarily the carpet that excites me. It's like I get to talk to like a filmmaker like James Bray and that's really exciting.

18:44Jasmine Enberg: But Reese's ultimate goal is to create a film. The big thing stopping him is money. While he doesn't think he needs a huge budget, he does need funding and that's not readily accessible. It's also part of why Reese was there and why he's so excited about partnering with studios. I mean, he wants to get in front of the right people who are really hard to reach otherwise. And it's not just because he's a creator. I mean, it's the same for all filmmakers when it comes to funding. Yeah. And speaking of funding, one other really interesting nugget we learned on the ground there is that unlike most countries, the US doesn't have any government funding for independent cinema.

19:15Honestly, that didn't surprise me. But this was on full display across the film festival because there were tents set up for basically every country from Saudi Arabia to Poland to Estonia. and basically all of these were sponsored by their governments. The U.S. also had a tent, too, in fact, but they are not funded by the federal government. Indy Wire hosts the American Pavilion. There's also a U.S. pavilion. And they bring in sponsors. Like this year, they had United Airlines as well as the state of California. The American Pavilion actually was also the very first one to be there before any of the other countries did it.

19:51It's just so emblematic of the U.S. versus the rest of the world. I don't know if you felt this way, Kaya, but I was like, this is like a physical manifestation of like all the things that we kind of associate the US, especially versus Europe with. Like America is always a front runner in so many different things, but it's also just so decentralized and privately funded. And they love to have a sponsor for everything.

20:13Jasmine Enberg: Yeah. I mean, the tents, like just the sheer amount of tents and all the different flags from around the world. Like we were like, wow, like literally everyone has some sort of funding for cinema except us. Markiplier also touched on the funding issue. You know, he talked about how he was rejected from film festivals before. He tried to bring his movie to market originally kind of the old-fashioned way. But he spoke about, you know, the stigma YouTubers face in the industry and ultimately why he opted to self-fund his film. Also, what was so interesting is that almost all of the success stories of creators and movies have been in the horror genre.

20:48I know that I mean that struck me too because we also learned about a Swedish creator who made a horror slasher film called Feed in 2022 that did really well domestically and my first thought as to why here was that it feels like horror is probably one of the most accessible and low-lift genres both in terms of content and budget like that's no shame to to creators or to horror movie makers but just thinking you know across the gamut of all these different types of genres it seems to kind of lean in that direction. We asked Reese about this too, and he agreed on the budgeting side of things, but he also said this.

21:22I think horror is one that is often disrespected, and I feel like digital creators are often like can be looked down on. I don't know if I call it an art form, but like, yeah, I think there's an art form to editing. I think there's an art form to storytelling. And I think telling a story in under 60 seconds is just as big a feat as telling one in 60 minutes. So I think there's that chip on the shoulder kind of thing that's maybe underlying a little bit that horror is very often disrespected and written off similarly to digital.

21:53Jasmine Enberg: So maybe we will see a horror film from Reese soon or a horror comedy because he loves to combine those genres. So moving on to our takeaways, obviously it is a huge moment for the Marché du film to have its own creator economy summit. Like we said at the top of the episode, The Cannes Film Festival is the most prestigious international film event. And don't just take our word for it. John Travolta, when he won an honorary Palme d 'Or, said, this is beyond the Oscar. To be fair, though, John Travolta has never won an Oscar. Okay, but justice for John Travolta, because he hasn't been nominated.

22:26Jasmine Enberg: I'm totally kidding. It was just such a great comment. No, but it does show, right, like the prestige of this event and why creators want to be there, right? They want to be part of this. I think that prestige is also one of the reasons why they've been slower to embrace creators. A lot of the film and art world still looks down on creators, even as Hollywood has started to work with them on TV shows. Honestly, I think a lot of the film and art world also still looks down on Hollywood. Yeah, and Reese has been at the Cannes Film Festival for four years, which is pretty wild. But over that time, he said he hasn't seen an uptick in creators on the red carpet.

23:00Jasmine Enberg: So the film industry is still just at the very beginning of figuring out how to work with creators and vice versa. But a new generation of filmmakers may very well come from YouTube and people, especially younger generations, ultimately may not differentiate between their content and traditional film anymore. Yeah, I mean, we talk about this all the time, but the lines are really blurring. And if you think about the younger generations, I mean, they just do not have the same associations with traditional Hollywood, TV shows or for movies. I mean, for them, YouTubers and other creators are celebrities.

23:31And Scarlett Johansson is always the example that I go to. It's super fitting here, of course, because of her connection to the film festival. But to me, she is like one of the most famous people in the world. But if you ask Gen Z or Gen Alpha, they probably won't even recognize her, but they will definitely recognize Mr. Beast or Mark Rober. So it's not just attention that has shifted, but the idea of celebrity has really changed as well.

23:56Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, and this is very well illustrated on social media, because there are creators who will just ask random people on the street, like they'll hold up two different photos of a traditional actor and a creator. And many get celebrities wrong. I mean, people get the creators wrong sometimes too, but like a lot of the celebrities are not being recognized. Yeah, I mean, to be fair, I'm terrible with names. So I would probably not be able to answer either, but I would be able to recognize the face. But anyway, it's also not just actors or celebrities. Like I've seen a video like this where they've shown younger generations a photo of Tom from Myspace and they haven't known who it is.

24:28And I'm like, wow, now I feel really old.

24:30Jasmine Enberg: Oh, what a shame. He's such a tech icon. He really is. But another thing we took away from the festival is that traditional film studios also have a lot to learn from creators in the creator economy. One of the things we heard repeatedly on the ground is that more studios need to take a more creator-like approach to bringing their films to market. And what this means is that traditional filmmakers really need to start thinking like creators and building an audience first, also prioritizing marketing, getting creative with that marketing strategy versus, you know, creating a film and then hoping it'll find an audience later and that somebody will buy it.

25:02And also that kind of speaks to what I think is the biggest difference or one of the biggest differences between creators and traditional artists. Like Like, creators aren't as concerned about the money and the art being close together. They expect it to be, and they don't think that it devalues the work. And I think, you know, they're also just so used to integrating brands into their content. So they just don't see that as an issue the way that some traditional filmmakers, especially indie filmmakers, might.

25:26Jasmine Enberg: But creators also have a lot to learn from the film industry, too. Markiplier talked a little bit about this on stage, saying that creators have to respect the art that came before them. It's also just an entirely different thing to make a film. home obviously than what many creators are typically doing on social media like yes some youtubers post an hour-long video and if you think about like early youtube and Casey Neistat and Shane Dawson like they were definitely making things that felt more similar to documentaries in long form but since the rise of TikTok in 2020 I mean the main trend that continues to dominate social media is still short-form content and creators are very good at creating you know short clips that capture attention.

26:07Jasmine Enberg: But creating something compelling for 90 minutes or two hours is much harder. And it obviously requires different storytelling skills, equipment, crew, I mean, the list goes on and on. And it's scripted, right? I mean, of course, there are documentaries, but a lot of the convergence we've even seen with creators and TV is through reality TV shows. And you know, when you think about films, you're really thinking about scripted content. But you know, to your larger point, I mean, yes, totally. Like, how do you keep somebody's attention for an hour and 20 minutes and now sometimes even three hours because movies have gotten ridiculously long?

26:39Like it's a totally different type of storytelling. Like sure, the principles are the same, but I would argue that it's much more challenging. And you know, there is a pipeline problem right now. I mean, we saw a recent report from Spotter that showed that just 0.02 % of all social video created by creators is fit for TV right now in terms of like length, viewership, and production. And that means the percentage of creators that are developing content that's fit for the cinema is way lower than that. And that's basically already almost zero. But on a positive note, I mean, we do have to say that creators' ability to capture attention fast and at scale is the exact reason why film studios want to work with them.

27:21They know that they need to generate buzz, they need to capture attention in order to get audiences excited about the movie and into theaters. and a movie trailer just isn't going to cut it anymore. I mean, there just isn't a central place to reach people. And if you think about a movie trailer, like that's really part of monoculture. And now everyone's attention is just so fragmented and personalized and people want to get recommendations from people who they like and who they trust. And for better or for worse, I mean, that's creators.

27:49Jasmine Enberg: Bottom line, we don't expect a sudden influx of creators to be suddenly making movies, but more of them are interested and will try. what we definitely will see grow is the relationship between studios and creators who are recognizing their power in marketing movies. But ultimately, I think many creators will opt to not go into filmmaking. I mean, they have been able to go directly to audiences, and that's part of the appeal of the creator economy in the first place, right? They haven't had to get their content greenlit by studios or entertainment executives or by anyone, right? They haven't had to deal with any sort of gatekeepers.

28:21Jasmine Enberg: They create what they want, and to have to navigate all these hoops and challenges is not something many will want to do. I know. And now that Markiplier is selling his movie directly on YouTube, if that happens again, I mean, there's another route for creators to not have to take the traditional route to bringing a movie or another type of content to market. We also have to say that not every creator wants to be in a movie or to make a movie. And Amanda McCants, who's a very funny creator, talked about this on stage at the Scalable Summit. I mean, there are just so many different types of businesses that creators can have, from product lines to coaching businesses to events to cookbooks, like the list goes on.

28:58And some of these are probably more lucrative than doing a one-off movie or, you know, having a role in a TV show.

29:05Jasmine Enberg: But like we said, we're only at the very start of the convergence between film and creators, and we're excited to see what happens and follow all of this closely. So we have a very entertainment-themed episode today, but to pivot a little bit to comedy, earlier this month, we went to a show that was part of Netflix is a Joke Comedy Festival in LA. The performance included several stand-up comedians, but the main event was Michael Longfellow, who is formerly of SNL. We went to the show with Scott Dunn, who we've known for several years, and he works with Longfellow. They've developed a new show together called The Void on social media.

29:39We sat down with Scott the day after the comedy show to record an episode in person. We talk about how comedy has changed because of social media, whether or not brands are becoming more comfortable with the format and topics, and what is next for his new company, Unicorn.

29:54Jasmine Enberg: Unicorn, which raised nearly$1 million in funding and launched less than a year ago, is a new type of talent management firm where it signs 50-50 partnership deals with creators with the goal of building out shows and other IP. It's also the brains behind a new YouTube comedy show called Human Trials with comedian Mark Norman. The show hit 40 ,000 YouTube subscribers in just 10 days. A month in, the show now has twice as many followers across social platforms and 25 million views across its channels. Let's dive in with Scott. Tell us a little bit about Michael Longfellow, because obviously people know him from SNL, but tell us a little bit about, I know you're working with him, but we were dying laughing.

30:29Jasmine Enberg: It was so funny. He's great, right? You know what struck me also? I've not been on my phone for so long. Nobody was on their phones. No one was on their phones. It's so nice. He came out, people took some pictures, like no one was even like checking. It's so nice. Although he was jokingly encouraging everybody to take their phones out. I know. Which I love too. Is that normal? Like I don't go to a lot of stand-up comedy shows. Is that normal? So funny enough, the night before I went to Mark Norman's show because, you know, we work with him, too. And they required everyone to put their phone in those pouches.

30:54I guess sometimes if it's like sensitive and new material, they don't want it leaked. Other times they just want you to be present.

30:59Jasmine Enberg: They didn't do that. They didn't have any requirements yesterday. No, no. Exactly. But it was so engaging. And how many experiences do we have where we don't want to look at our freaking phones? I mean, we're so chronically online. You're right. I hadn't even like thought about it. And if you in comedy, you'll miss the joke. Yeah. And he's sort of like at the beginning, too. Like, he's like, let's get the crowd work out of the way. Like he sort of was alluding to kind of what we're seeing with the overlap now of stand-up comedy and like what we're seeing on social media. But he was like, clip this, big fault, big fault.

31:25Jasmine Enberg: I want to talk to you about that because I know you work with so many comedians. What was it in the old days? Like you would just do stand-up comedy and hope people would come? What did it look like to become a comedian? What was the path? Well, here's the funny thing. The old days are still today. Basically what they do is they hop around from stage to stage. like if you're in new york even mark someone as big as mark norman he does like four or five shows a night just hopping around the city and it could be the biggest crowds or it could be a crowd of 15 20 people so you're doing like stage work and then now you have a podcast and once every year or so you do a special and like all things sort of ladder up to that special and then it's like rinse and repeat and like maybe you'll do some acting here or there but like that's kind of what it's like to be a comedian so i always think of like all right how do you zag what's nobody doing because you know everyone has a podcast specials now used to be a little bit more of this call it a special thing because it required a lot of capital and distribution now comedians are putting it on on youtube so everyone kind of has one so it feels a little less i don't know i guess rare than it used to be is the north star still to have like a netflix comedy special or like i think it is in order to get that special at least in the olden days like you needed to be discovered and i think that's the one really big difference now where like before it was like just going from stage to stage, like you said, and hoping to be discovered.

32:41Is that the case? Yeah. And now you have social as a vehicle. You have distribution now, like the specials and even like go to just television and film, right? Like sure. They have the ability, the capital to produce and make a thing, but really what entertainers needed was the distribution to reach new audiences now on social, like it's all in your hands. And even beyond just now, I'm seeing every day a new account, a new show, a new creator, like zero to like a million. in days just because these algorithms are recognizing content that people want. And if they detect that, they're going to disseminate it.

33:13And now suddenly people are just blowing up. You don't need that third party distribution anymore. Don't you think that makes it more challenging, though, when you see more and more, you know, comedians turning to social media, it's getting more crowded. Like, how do you break through in all of that? It's so crowded. Yeah. And we can take it back to Longfellow because he talks a lot about SNL and the people behind, not to name names, but the people behind SNL to make SNL what it is. They talk about zagging. They wanted to find diamonds in the rough, people who just are visually distinct, comedically distinct.

33:44And if you kind of take a step back and look over the years, you're right. Like an SNL talent is sort of cut from a very similar cloth. So in terms of how I view everything that, you know, the creators we like to sign, the shows we like to launch, you have to visually look different. Like I just kind of have an obsession over that. I mean, our clients, a corgi in a frigging backpack, three old Jewish men, a dark, long-haired, pretty boy and long fellow. it's the easiest way to separate yourself from an otherwise crowded world that we live in where everything's looking the same and sounding the same it's such a cheat code to just be like oh in a group of 100 people that one person stands out so i'm gonna pay a little more attention to

34:18Jasmine Enberg: that person that's who i like to cling to how difficult is it to go from like short form because if you think about like when you're scrolling through tiktok like you just want like the joke right like you don't have the whole lead up you don't like how hard is it especially for you know these comedians who are kind of starting social first like how hard is it for them to then stand on stage for 30 minutes and deliver. Because it's a different skill set. Yeah. And obviously they can, you know, it's different because they have to interact with the audience and all this stuff. But like, how hard is that?

34:42I've been thrown into the comedy vertical and I'm applying my like creator economy brain to it. So that's why we're doing so many unique things.

34:48Jasmine Enberg: What do you mean by thrown by? Like you just kind of started getting funny clients? Well, okay. Allie Fishbein, shout out Allie. I love you. We hired her as a manager and she had been booking comedy shows in New York City for five years because her specialty is comedy. She's been able to bring on unbelievable talent. And so we're throwing like the whole Critter Economy IP playbook at comedy. We can talk about Longfellow and Mark Norman, two great comedians who are launching shows with. You know, they thought the only way to do this is to go to the studios and the networks and try to get something green lit and then fund it.

35:24For us, we're going from idea to launch in like weeks. They can't even like wrap their heads around it. But that's the beauty of this industry that we operate in.

35:31Jasmine Enberg: So how do you approach it? Everything's around a show format or not necessarily? Yeah, kind of. We just believe in IP. So first off, we very rarely if ever have like an idea. And it's like, okay, let's go cast it. It's like, we just want to meet people who are so unbelievable and then try to find a format or a show that's built for them and like only them. So like The Void, which is a show we have with Longfellow, he's like this floating head oracle. He's like Zordon from Power Rangers. and like, he's just such like an intellectually weird. Visually different. Oh, you think? And like darkness, it's called the void.

36:06We want people to like throw a confession into like the internet void to like live on forever. And we met Michael. He just is so weird in the best ways. And like, you can just talk to him for hours and it's just hilarious. And his perspective is special. Where are you launching the void? What platform? That is a short form format that's sort of built for Instagram and TikTok, which is rare for us because usually we like to tailor things for YouTube. But that one is just a short snackable. It's kind of like our subway takes. And only he could be the face of that show. Like there is no void without Longfellow.

36:35Jasmine Enberg: Talk through some of the success stories you've seen. Like obviously these are new formats. And what have you seen so far in terms of traction for some of these shows? So we launched a show called Human Trials with Mark Norman pretty much an exact month ago. It went viral in like minutes. So the format is, and this is again me thinking about comedy in a very unconventional way. I'll watch comedians, whether it's five minutes or an hour. and I get bored watching them. I just want to see who they're talking to. I want to see like the audience, how they're reacting to things. And when they sometimes in special show the audience, even for a split second, like I find somebody and I just watch that person respond to the comedy.

37:10I think it's fascinating. How do you make something about the audience a little more than the individual comic?

37:15Jasmine Enberg: For social. Built for social, built for YouTube, that's stunty, that's weird, experimental. So we came up with Human Trials, which is basically imagine a comedian walking on stage and not knowing who they're performing in front of. and the audience is made up of one single demographic of people. So literally the pilot was - Is it always the same demographic? It changes every time. Okay. So the pilot was with 50 Gen Z girls. These are like 22 year old girls. And you think, how do they respond to comedy? Do they all laugh at the same things? Do they don't? And in between the show, we actually do a Q &A and we ask them like, what were you offended by?

37:47What show were you okay with?

37:49Jasmine Enberg: And this is taking place in person. In person. With everyone in the audience. And because we're calling it human trials, like Mark's in a lab coat. the crew is in hazmat suits it feels like dystopian in a weird way and i'm telling you like we launched the show so in in about two weeks we eclipse over 20 million views like cross social youtube has over 50 000 subscribers but the thing went like gangbusters immediately honestly i think it's such a great example of traditional entertainment youtube like colliding this is what it looks like and so at what point did the comedians find out who the demographic five seconds before.

38:22Five seconds before? Oh, so they do know before they go on stage. I thought there was going to be like a big reveal at some point. Like Mark tells them and then opens the door and it's like, oh shit.

38:31Jasmine Enberg: So they have to think on their feet. They do. Okay, you got Gen Z Girls. Who else? Okay, so Gen Z Girls was one. The second, bald men. Just 50 bald men. Because it's just funny for no reason. How do you source 50 bald men? Whoever our audience curator is, Booker, like we should give them a raise. And here are the next three. ready um i mean first off the list we have like a list of hundreds there's no bad idea it's hilarious uh so you shot 50 clowns 50 that's my worst name 50 clowns isn't it say 50 old people yeah and then 50 japanese businessmen it's crazy this is outrageous it's not it's not so to pivot a little bit how do you think about monetizing these shows because i mean totally obviously last night, it was so funny, but a lot of the jokes were very crude.

39:24And like you think about comedy, right? It's comedy and it's part of it. But how do you think about bringing brands into that environment, especially when they're so concerned about somebody saying something that might reflect poorly on them? It's such a good question. And it's something I've been obsessing over because traditionally brands aren't like clamoring towards comedy for those reasons. However, comedy is at like the epicenter of our culture. It's so omnipresent on social. Comedians have cult-like communities, the things that every creator, you know, desires for. Like, you know, Mark, he can do anything and people are showing up.

39:57But these comedians don't really work with many brands. But I think they're starting to recognize, oh, we have to, like, step outside our comfort zones ever so slightly just because they have the ability to move the needle. Now, it's on me, especially for a show like Human Trials, which is, like, you know, visceral and sometimes salacious to not turn off brands. But we can't, like, not be who we are. It's a very like tight rope to walk. What kind of brands are you thinking about partnering with? Do you have like an ideal partner in mind? It starts with like either brands who are starting to sponsor comedy like Dr.

40:27Squatch or like brands that are pretty edgy who kind of don't give an F and are willing to kind of go for it. And I could shout out a few of those.

40:35Jasmine Enberg: Are there any kind of partnerships you can point to so far? No. I mean, the show's so young, but I'm actively beginning like outreach and starting to facilitate those conversations. Does it help to have like launch it, have the numbers versus like trying to bring a brand on before it launches? Yes, exactly. And brands are always looking to do more of those. I feel like fundamentally you need to start in sort of a grassroots capacity, even if it's just weeks. If you launch with a brand, which is a great strategy, like I'd love to be profitable from day one. It starts off in a place that I'm typically not super comfortable with.

41:07I just want to make sure it's cool and has cachet and we're making it just to make it. And then once we prove it as fast as possible, okay, now time to monetize. But it's a good question because I think about this a lot. There's a lot of shows on social, a lot of great shows. And I have no idea what the business model is. The short form stuff that may be a little more expensive to make that's built for Instagram, it's just in service of brands, which is fine. But I'm trying to build businesses. So if it doesn't have four or five, potentially 10 plus revenue streams, I'm not as interested in making it.

41:37So what other revenue streams are you looking at? Or do you imagine that brand partnerships will be the primary? It's the lowest hanging fruit. So sponsorships, platform revenue, like tier one. Tier two, like how do we go on tour? Like how do we, you know, live stream it, ticket in? Then there's commerce. Then there's licensing. Is there a paywall for incremental content? Exactly. Like it kind of can keep derivatives. Like how do we spin off using this platform?

42:02Jasmine Enberg: How much is there overlap with kind of traditionally how, you know, comedians have made money, right? Like tickets is really the main one. and working with streaming platforms like that. Yeah, it kind of is. Are your clients, when you're signing people, are they coming in with a lot of brand relationships or not really? Very few, if ever. And also another point, and you touched on this earlier. This is so hilarious. Like online creators, they're leaning more towards traditional in a lot of ways. They're trying to get on stage and tour like a comedian does. And on the other side, these comedians are trying to be more online creator.

42:31When did you launch? We launched 11 months ago. So it was June 25. So we're not even a year old. And we have three main pillars to our company. Our business model is really unique, like kind of one of the few in the industry.

42:46Jasmine Enberg: Are you talent management? Like how do you describe yourself? I don't know if we're a talent management company with like an IP arm or if we're an IP company with a talent management arm. Which would you like to be? IP. Okay. But in my experience, and this is like tales old as time in media, right? Like studios are a little afraid to work with talent because eventually talent leaves upon success. So I always and I've experienced that launching a couple really big shows in my career, but it does always lead that way because incentives aren't fully aligned. Every day that passes, both sides are kind of going in opposite directions.

43:17So I thought like how in our model, how do you earn longevity? You have to ensure incentives are aligned. Well, how do you ensure incentives are aligned? Well, you have to be true partners and grow in the same direction. So if we manage the creator, we're the right-hand person day-to-day, right? They're in their inner circle. And then as any good manager should, we implore everyone to develop IP. Okay, well, how can they develop IP? Well, under management, you now have exclusive access to our studio where we have a production team. We fund these things and we develop it and operate it. And we cut them in as true partners.

43:48Jasmine Enberg: So these are all 50-50. All 50-50. So when a show blows up, rises the tide for the creator's individual business. now we're their manager and we're producing the show. So we're going in the same direction. We've earned a lot of trust among both sides. If it's a partnership where it's like, all right, I'm going to pay you to be a talent as a host on a show that we own. It's great. But ultimately, as you, you know, we've all seen the show blows up and they're the face of it, but they don't own it. Yeah. Okay. There could be some resentment. So that's our model and kind of one of the first to do it, which is pretty cool.

44:18Jasmine Enberg: What's been the feedback from creators? Like, do they feel good about the 50 50? And especially, I think what's important is you're kind of bringing in talent and helping incubate them, right? Like you're not going to like mega, you know, people that have already, you know, blown up, right? Yeah. But we've had more conversations of late from those people who are a little more established, but it's so interesting because like you can be an incredibly established creator and still be in dire need of the resources that we have, right? The ability to make really great IP. So we're trying to navigate that as like, I've been telling a lot of folks, every new creator we sign is bigger than the last one.

44:55It just keeps ticking up and up, which is exciting for us because less risk. It's already a monetizable asset day one, but we don't want to lose the ethos.

45:06Jasmine Enberg: Well, that's the thing. As you're thinking about scaling, is there a cap on clients? We're building mini studios and mini businesses around a creator. You can't do that for hundreds of creators. We have to be hyper-selective and believe that they are worth that bet, time, and money. And, you know, there's only so many of those we can sign ultimately as we scale. Like, yeah, we can sign a few more creators to then hire a few more content producers that hire a few more business operators. But even so, you know, I've been a part of explosive IP and it can overtake your company. And it's like a good problem, but like it happens really fast.

45:39So I am sensitive to signing too many creators who want to be a part of this and sort of ultimately underperform.

45:46Jasmine Enberg: How many do you have now? 30. 30. Oh my God. I know. And how big is your team? Yeah. How big is your team? Five of us. I'm exhausted. Do I look tired? What we do at Unicorn is so much more evolved respectfully than what a traditional manager would do. So when I say manager, I'm like, well, I'm a manager. I'm a business builder. I'm a content producer. Like, what is that? How do you sort of communicate that? But anyway, when it comes to creators, we sign, I say this to everyone when we sign them. I'll say it to the world right now. Like, Like we are partners. Like I need you to do what you're here to do and we'll do what we need to do.

46:21And that's how this thing will succeed. Thanks so much for tuning in and we'll see you here next Thursday.