Last Sunday (on a very boring Sunday, mind you), I stumbled upon Nancy. Nancy Roder. She’s the girl you always overlooked on the middle school playground. The one who never got picked in gym class. She never had cool clothes, and was more likely found by herself in the lunchroom than surrounded by friends. But you won’t meet a nicer person than Nancy.

I’m not really sure how Nancy’s specific character came about (it’s an odd amalgamation of my 4th grade art teacher and several kids I remember from middle/high school), but it’s safe to say that when I put on the wig and the glasses and the fake zits and braces I bought from a local costume shop, it’s not difficult to remember how I felt growing up.

So you’re probably wondering what the point of all this is? Nancy’s the part of me who never felt good enough. She wants to help those who never got a real chance and maybe make a friend or two in the process. Maybe I’m crazy, but I don’t want Nancy to leave. So I entered her in a contest. There’s a $100,000 prize at the end of the pot, enough to fund my first independent film. About Nancy. Here is her video entry:

She’s never been able to travel outside of Sherman, Oklahoma. Her dream is to see the world, make a few friends, and help other people achieve their dreams along the way. And when it’s all said and done, she’s going to buy an RV for her parents so that theycan see the world, too. It’s weird. I’ve almost taken on Nancy’s dreams as my own.

I want to make this project happen. In my head, it’s a feature/web series/personal quest that will allow me to reach my first dream of making a movie, Nancy’s dream of seeing the world, and helping at least ten individuals reach their dreams, too. (If Nancy wins, I’ve pledged to donate $10,000 to ten people for their assistance in the contest.) I’m also planning on handing out a few other little surprises along the way, but more on that later.

So here’s the deal. To win, Nancy’s entry needs to have the greatest number of ratings and comments. I’m coming into the contest a month after it began (so there’s a little disadvantage there), but I know with the help of friends and new media mavens I can help Nancy’s dream (and mine) come to be a reality.

Please, please, rate the video and comment everyday (which also helps increase your chances of winning one of the ten $1,000 prizes). Beyond the $10,000 I’ll give away if Nancy wins, I will be giving away some additional little prizes to people who include a link to the video on their blog. (I’ve got a Google Alert up on “Nancy Roder.”)

The contest ends Dec. 20, and the video with the greatest total of comments and ratings wins the prize. I just need you to embed, Tweet, Blog, Facebook, Digg, and/or email the YouTube link to anyone/everyone.

Thank you all so much for your help! And, if you’d like to see the original Nancy video that got this all started:

Wow! For everyone out there who emailed, tweeted, Facebooked, Dugg, favorited, and blogged about The Booby Scare – thank you! The point of this campaign was to create awareness and we are so happy that so many people have helped us by jumping on the “spread the word” bandwagon.

To sum it up: The Booby Scare has earned more than 340,000 hits on Funny or Die (it’s also on YouTube, Break, Amazon Video, etc), and made the front page of Digg and the #1 Top in Video Widget on it’s release date.

A special thank-you to E! News, OMG.Yahoo, USA Today, and K-ROQ Radio for their coverage, as well as the following blogs:

JUST JARED: Alyson Hannigan & Minka Kelly: Booby Scare!

HUFFINGTON POST: Breast Health Month: Know Your Girls, Take The Pledge

HUFFINGTON POST: Celebs Promote “Touch A Tit, Save A Tit”: The Booby Scare

SPORTS CRACKLE POP: The Booby Scare

CANCERNEWSTODAY.COM: Taryn Southern and Jaime King’s Celeb Slumber Party

MOBIZ: CELEB ‘SAVE A TIT’ CAMPAIGN

MYBLANKHURTS.COM: THE BOOBY SCARE

JAY LOVES IT: Entertainment News At It’s Best: Booby Scare!

ECORAZZI: The Booby Scare: Celebrity Ladies Promote Breast Cancer Awareness …

MISS CELLANIA.COM: THE BOOBY SCARE

The more aware we are, the more lives we will save. If you’re too young to be at risk or you already know you’re in the clear, in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month, please, please remind your mother, grandmother, aunt, niece, friend, WHOMEVER (and don’t count out the men!) to get checked!

Hey zombie fans! If you like horror and you like comedy, you’ve got to check out Woke Up Dead, which premieres with it’s first five episodes TODAY on Crackle.com. The series stars Jon Heder, Josh Gad, and Krystin Ritter, and follows one office nerd’s quest to discover…is he really dead?

Here’s the 1-minute preview:

I was so very fortunate to get to spend a day on set with the cast and crew, and you’ll get to see my ‘lil cameo sprinkled throughout a few episodes in the series.

Below are a few behind-the-scenes photos of my scenes with Krystin, Josh, and Jon – who are all just as nice in real life as they are funny on the screen. I’ll post some more later this week.

Thanks so much to Stan Rogow and everyone at Electric Farm, Director Tim O’Donnell, and creator John Fasano for letting me crash the set…and thank you to Crackle.com for the pics :-) I had a blast!

The Set

Wow. First off, let me just say thank all of you out there who have graced me with your comments and emails.  It was over two years ago that my first viral video surpassed the 2 mil mark, and now it looks like Wrong Hole is going to win the prize for most online views. Between YouTube, Break, and FunnyOrDie, it’s now well on it’s way over 3 mil hits.

Special thanks to blogs like  Today’s Big Thing, PureStyle Magazine’s blog, Spiked Humor, FastHack, Dave and Thomas Daily TimeKillers, The GoldenBoy Saga, GeorgeCarlinTV, Shoutback, and the many others who passed it along.

I didn’t realize that taking it up the bum could be such a universal source of comedy. I’ve received emails from Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, Phillippines, Russia, France, Poland, Turkey, Africa, the Middle East, Peru, and students from both West Point and the Coast Guard military academy here in the US. Some of my favorite excerpts I have posted below, as they were a little tough to decipher:

Rob (Netherlands): “you sounds so good, its almost magic, make a love song with a piano, and stuff!”

Kael (Location Unknown): “I shivered when I heard her. She has power. She remmembered me of Celine Dion.”

Stephan (Germany): “My simple question now is, if there are some recent pics of you for my desktop =) P.S.: You are not in the german Wikipedia”

Jim (Missouri): “I did notice one fault you have however as I browsed through your site, You’re a Liberal. Where’s your priorities?”

There were other messages, sweet and to the point, and others (more of the death threat type) from the Middle East and parts of America. But I won’t share those in an effort to keep this blog as positive as possible ;-)

Thanks for watching!

Taryn

Mr. Belding, perverted daydreams, short skirts, and more round out the six-episode Private High Musical series. Thank you so much to everyone who helped me make this awesomely-fun web series. It was a BLAST. We are really working hard to turn PHM into a film, so hopefully you all will get to see much more of Sandra, Ashley Slutsky, Shoe, and all the other PHM characters in the near future.

xo
T

Hey guys! It feels like it’s been forever since I blogged up here (I guess it has been almost a week! yikes!)  I’ve been sick and a little under the weather, so it took a little motivation to get to work today.

I wanted to let you know that although Hott 4 Hill 2 hasn’t seen that many hits on YouTube, on MySpace we have 150,000 hits! I also got some really awesome comments in my inbox (and 1,000 friend requests….OMG!) so I just wanted to share a few of them with you:

Hey just call me a fan of your video, hott4hill. thats fuckin awesome dude. im not one for politics, im military. i let the politicians fight their own war. but that video had me bustin a gut dude. keep singin.

my sides hurt that vid was the shit, you are really funny and hott(well.duh!) keep up the good work i hope to see more . p.s. editing was hella good to. Captain Pat

You didn’t say much about John….. It seems no one does. That’s ok, but why not? We should focus on the issues and not how cool Obama is. So vote Mcain!!! Love Mike…P.S Your Video was good! I’m glad there are young people who care. Even if we don’t agree!

Hey everyone, it’s finally here!!! This is the first episode of Private High Musical.

Here’s the synopsis of the first episode:

Welcome to Private High Musical. Where sex and drugs “are always cool.” It’s the middle of senior year and shy Sandra Smith is the new girl in town. As if her virginal status isn’t horrifying enough, things go from bad to worse when Sandra suddenly experiences the joys of womanhood….in first period.

If you haven’t seen the trailer yet, it’s here:

http://www.taryn-southern.com/blog/2008/09/private-high-musical-trailer/

And don’t forget to go to privatehighmusical.com for info about the cast and to subscribe!