rantsofajerk

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Seriously youtube, WTF?

(Pictured L-R; The GLORY HOLE star Philip Richardson, cohost Ruttegar Mannequine and show creator Dave O’Shea, seated and plotting revenge. Photo credit: Kerry Doss)

SERIOUSLY, youtube. What the F**K?

Hi, kids! Haven’t posted on here in a while but, well, something came up.

For those who don’t know me, I’m Dave O’Shea, an independent filmmaker and artist in San Francisco. VERY independent. I've written, produced, directed, edited and occasionally acted in dozens of self-funded microbudget productions over the past 15+ years, including an award winning horror feature (DAY JOB), numerous short films and a late night public access sketch comedy series called The GLORY HOLE which has been airing in San Francisco and various Bay Area cities for the past six years and counting. 

Like most underground filmmakers striving to gain a broader audience, I've been posting many of my creations on youtube for well over a decade. Trailers for my films, clips and ads promoting my TV show, cultural mini-documentaries, music videos I've shot, random comedy and animated shorts, anything and everything. Not only is it the most visible platform out there, it's easily the best way for artists like myself to put our work out there--to be seen, enjoyed and possibly even to get us discovered by the ‘gatekeepers’ and advance our careers. Nothing I’ve posted has gone ‘viral’ per se, but I’ve accumulated tens of thousands of views over the years, which ain’t bad for a virtual unknown.

As a purveyor mainly of horror and dark comedy, much of the content I create is confrontational, subversive, provocative, political and deeply satirical. The intent with my current project, The GLORY HOLE, is to blend the most ridiculously absurd premises with topics that I'm genuinely passionate about, both pro- and against. There's a recurring bit throughout the series where our host (Phil Richardson) complains about some insane situation currently going on in the country and he stares right into the camera and chastises, "Just Stop It, America! You're Embarrassing Yourself!" Targets frequently include racism, religious fanaticism, disposable fads, nationalism, police brutality and good ol’ American stupidity in general. No shortage of any of the above to throw artistic stones at in 2023, sadly.

On the absurdism side, the show's cohost is a mannequin named Ruttegar who speaks exclusively in static fuzz and random bleeps, yet the host always knows exactly what he's talking about. He's a drug addict, a shameless womanizer and sometimes murderer. And a mannequin. I did mention he's a mannequin, right? Okay. 

The show, which airs uncensored late at night (Fridays at 11pm in San Francisco on SF Commons Channel 29 and Hayward on Chabot TV Channel 28, streaming online at www.bavc.org/sfcommons), occasionally includes brief nudity or sexual situations (99% of which involve crudely produced cartoon animation or the aforementioned mannequin) and mild comedic violence--always for a laugh, never remotely what anyone in their right mind could consider pornographic or in any way harmful to any consenting adult viewer. That said, whenever I've posted a clip from the show on youtube involving anything sexual or with, for example, an exposed butt cheek or (gasp!) a female breast, I've always gone out of my way to cover them with either a censor bar or blur them out. Seemed pretty simple to me; youtube doesn't allow nudity. Got it. No problem. Moving on.

Over the past year but in rapid succession over the past few months especially, I've been randomly receiving notifications saying youtube had flagged a video, adding an '18+ Age Restriction' on it. Their notification reads, in part: "We have reviewed your content and determined that it may not be suitable for viewers under the age of 18, per our Community Guidelines... We haven't applied a strike to your channel [remember this part, it's important]... This means it will not be visible to viewers who are logged out, are under 18 years of age, or have Restricted Mode enabled."

While sometimes I felt the restriction was arguably fair, other times they were objectively wrong, and clearly applied by an AI bot. But, so as not to rock the boat, I just let it go. Never argued with them.

The real downside is these restrictions cause much lower viewership and engagement. I liken it to a shadowban on instagram, they don’t delete the content, but they keep just about anyone who isn’t actively engaged with your page or sent a direct link from seeing it. Even still, I'm a 'pick your battles' kinda guy, and these didn’t seem all that big a deal. After all, youtube's own policy states that a user’s page would only be at risk of termination after receiving 3 strikes for violating their rules, and right there in black and white in my notifications, they said they had not applied any strikes. None. Never once.  

Back to The GLORY HOLE. Production on the upcoming second season of the show began in June of 2021 and wrapped in June of this year. To put it mildly, it was quite an undertaking, as all microbudget productions tend to be. As of the time of this writing, 11 of the 12 new episodes are complete and one just has some minor tweaking to finish up. And it’s a huge step up from the previous season in every imaginable way; the storytelling, performances, music, animation and editing, everything. Safe to say everyone involved is super proud of what we’ve accomplished and can’t wait to share it with our beautiful “fans” and hopefully earn lots of new ones. 

In preparation for launching this new season, I spent much of this past June through mid-July combing through the first season of the show, editing more than thirty 2-3 minute ‘Best Of’ clips to share on youtube to send to the press, podcasts, etc., and to share with loyal fans who may enjoy a refresher before diving into the new material. On July 13th I uploaded the final handful of these bite sized videos, a couple of which were immediately flagged as Age Restricted/18+ (clearly AI-bots doing the flagging, as they hadn’t even finished uploading), but again, nothing out of the ordinary and seemingly no big deal. I repeat, per youtube’s own wording, Age Restricted videos do NOT put your channel at risk of termination.

So when I found the notification that they HAD, in fact, terminated my page in my email the next morning, without warning, claiming I had violated their community guidelines involving nudity, I immediately knew it was not a human who decided this. Why? Because I have never, ever posted anything involving exposed nudity whatsoever on the public youtube page. As I mentioned, I’d spent countless hours over the years animating censor bars to make sure nothing that could be considered nudity ended up on their public platform. Yes, even on the mannequin. I was that ridiculously careful.

After immediately filling out and submitting an appeal (the first of THREE thus far), I reached out on my social media to see if anyone knew someone who worked at youtube that I could be put in contact with. Having heard a bit in the past about how dismissively youtube treats small independent creators, I knew it would be wise to get some help. 

A good friend put me in touch with someone there and I messaged him on one of his socials. 

To his credit, this gentleman spent over a week reaching out to others within the company, attempting to initiate some sort of correspondence with whichever department may be able to assist. It should also be noted that youtube has virtually NO WAY to contact an actual human on their website, which is clearly by design. At one point, he asked for my personal email so he could add me in on an email thread with his manager. Seemed almost promising at this point...

Then a few more days passed. Then the weekend. No email received. I messaged again the following week, asking when I might expect to hear from the manager so we can begin to discuss how to fix this situation. All I wanted was to have a conversation and was totally open to whatever compromises we could agree on, even if that meant deleting some of the videos off the channel.

Then, I suspect prompted by his manager, he asked a very telling couple of questions about my terminated account: 

a) How many subscribers did I have?

and b) Was I a youtube business partner/did I run ads on my videos? 

And right then it clicked. 

What they were really asking was:

-Am I famous or important enough to have a conversation with?

-Do I make them money? 

When I expressed that I had a small but loyal fanbase (couple hundred subscribers at best) and no, I did not run ads on my videos, the manager suddenly didn’t have time to discuss anything with me. Shocking, right? 

Couple more days of radio silence again and finally he wrote back saying he’d heard through the grapevine that my page was terminated for being “too edgy” for their platform, but was given no details beyond that. 

I’m sorry, but how is being “edgy” a violation of youtube’s community guidelines? Forgive me for pointing out their blatant hypocrisy, but a platform that proudly showcases sexually graphic music videos with titles like “Wet Ass Pussy” and SNL skits like “Dick In A Box” (not to mention fully uncensored anal waxing videos, countless videos of police murdering unarmed people of color, brutal street violence, endless bullying, misogyny and bloody war footage, etc, etc, etc.), somehow my COMEDY videos with the sarcastic host and the mannequin sidekick is where they draw the line? Sure thing, youtube.

It’s crystal clear what they meant was they don’t like my material since I don’t generate ad revenue for them. This performative morality horseshit from a platform which literally gave rise to the mainstreaming of the American alt-right, let thousands of unhinged users to spread deadly misinformation during the covid 19 pandemic and continually allows harmful propaganda and racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic material, is nothing short of laughable.

[Side note: Alex Winter’s brilliant new documentary, The Youtube Effect, is essential viewing for those interested in how little they care about anything beyond raking in BILLIONS off the backs of its creators while fanning the flames of hatred and division. The recurring theme of the film is youtube simply does not care about who they harm. And why would they?]

In the weeks since this all started, I’ve done quite a bit of poking around online and I’ve seen a ton of evidence that my situation is not at all unique. It seems that the past couple of years in particular, youtube has been on a performative witch hunt of sorts, using any excuse to terminate channels that don’t perform for them, financially. Especially those with “edgy” content that may offend the religious right or other groups who organize and complain about whatever doesn’t fit into their puritanical, bigoted view of what constitutes acceptable material. They even took down legendary independent film studio Troma’s page just a few weeks before mine. Below is what they posted on instagram when it first happened:

Key sentence: “We have received a response from the Youtube team, and they have made it quite clear that independent art has no business on their platform.” Troma eventually got their page reinstated but only after weeks of thousands of their fans taking to twitter and an online petition DEMANDING they give it back. Which only highlights that youtube CAN do the right thing, but likely only will when it’s convenient or if too many people are pointing out their fully transparent hypocrisy in a public forum. It's now been a full month since my channel was effectively banned from youtube. I've submitted 3 separate appeals, ZERO of which have garnered anything beyond an automated 'received, thank you for your patience' response. Besides the unofficial correspondence with the employee, the only official interaction I've received from what *could* be an actual human has been on twitter. Seems pretty interesting to me that I've had to go to another platform to actually hear back from anyone. But still, they just say be patient and wait for the decision. 

And upon further inspection of the @TeamYoutube twitter page, their responses all appear to be cut and paste, so it’s most likely AI bots responding there as well. They claim in their automated responses that a decision whether or not to reinstate a suspended/terminated channel “should take 1-2 business days.” Well, it's been four weeks... and counting.

SERIOUSLY, youtube. What the F**K???

If you’d like to support me and my work going forward, please follow:

instagram.com/diabloshea for all the latest updates and happenings

vimeo.com/diabloshea where you can watch some of what youtube unjustly deleted RIGHT NOW!

The GLORY HOLE returns with ALL NEW episodes Fridays at 11pm pacific, starting in September! Watch HERE 

Thanks for reading,

DO

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DAY JOB Talk

Couple recent interviews about THIS WEEKEND’S DAY JOB screening.  The one you should totally go to if you’re in the SF Bay Area. You’re welcome.

https://youtu.be/NM2o0QxVXnY

https://soundcloud.com/horrorfi-me-podcast/episode-48

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DAY JOB 5th ANNIVERSARY Screening!!

HEY KIDS!! I’ve been a HORRIBLE Blogger lately, if you’re in the San Francisco Bay Area, come out and watch my acclaimed & super scummy little indie horror film DAY JOB this Sunday at New People Cinema in SF’s Japantown, part of SF IndieFest’s Another Hole in the Head Film Festival (where it took home the Audience Award for BEST LOCAL FEATURE in 2012).  Hope to see you there!!  Tickets & more info @  https://www.ahith.com/events/day-job-11-5-7pm

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JIZZ DYE is Here!!

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JIZZ Dye

You’re welcome.

NEW EPISODES of The GLORY HOLE “Coming” Soon!!  Stay Tuned, Kids

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THE GLORY HOLE Press Release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE GLORY HOLE  is a  bizarre  new comedy series from the mind of San Francisco Bay Area artist, author, and acclaimed independent filmmaker,  Dave O’Shea. Featuring a revolving cast of Bay Area actors and performers, the show loosely centers around a disorganized cable  access interview program hosted by Philip Richardson (as Dave O’Shea) and his troubled mannequin co-host,  Ruttegar.  According to its creator, "as the series progresses, it will likely become less and less about the  talk  show" and will take the viewer to “lots of strange, uncomfortable  places  that viewers will probably wish they hadn’t gone.”  So, how did THE GLORY HOLE come to be?  "This thing is a total fluke," O'Shea explains. "I'd been taking a TV production class at a community college in Hayward where they've got this super high-tech, state-of-the-art television studio, and they also happen to run a  few cable access stations out of there.  The studio’s director had seen some of the videos I had produced for the class and asked if I’d be interested in developing a show for one of their stations.  I’d always been more into stand-alone-story filmmaking, personally, so the thought of creating a TV series with multiple episodes was way out of my comfort zone, so, of course I had to say yes.” 

The real selling point for O’Shea was the fact that--although  KCMC (who will be airing THE GLORY HOLE  on  Friday  nights  at  11 pm and “re-airing in the deep late night [Sundays at 4:00 am & Tuesdays at 2:30 am] for all those stoners, college students, and insomniacs out there,” according to KCMC programmer, James Hill) would not be able to offer him a budget since it’s a non-profit, government access station--he would, however, be allowed complete  creative control. Furthermore, after 10 pm, the station has very loose censorship regulations and restrictions, so the 11 pm time slot is ideal for O’Shea’s brand of subversive and sometimes explicit and/or vulgar humor.  

“I’m not sure THE GLORY HOLE is what KCMC had in mind when they offered me a TV show, but  everyone  at the station has been super supportive and they’re just letting me do my thing with absolutely no  interference.  Having an outlet like this where I can create whatever I can  afford to pull off on my own is  incredibly  liberating.  And unlike most of what I've produced in the past,  this might actually get seen!”  

When asked what his intentions with the series are,  he replied, “I want it to feel like an uncomfortable  dream or maybe like you’re high on  expired cold medicine or something.  Probably  even  more  enjoyable if the viewer actually is high. I get just as much satisfaction from an audience staring in stunned silence as I do if they’re belly-laughing or something.  I never, ever expect  the general public to like or even understand what I do.  Any reaction is a good reaction.  And if they do end up enjoying it, even better.” 

O’Shea began his indie film career with the acclaimed micro-budget horror film, DAY JOB (2012), which took home the Audience Award for 'Best Local Feature' at  SF IndieFest’s Another Hole in the Head Film Festival in San Francisco, as well  as 'Best Exploitation  Film' and 'Best  Use of Violence/Gore' awards at Pollygrind Underground Film Festival in Las Vegas. He has since paved an unconventional path for  himself  with a  variety  of short films, most notably, the suspense thriller DAY AT THE BEACH (2014), where, during  production, a police officer actually pulled his gun on O'Shea as he thought he had just arrived at the scene of a  carjacking, and the subversive comedy/mockumentary  WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO WINK WOOLERY? (2017),  which will be  premiering at SF IndieFest's Cyberia VR Film Festival in July 2017 (co-starring THE GLORY HOLE’s Ed Gory and Debra Lamb). Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, in 2016 he wrote, illustrated and self-published the incredibly offensive adult coloring book “Billy and the Easter Bunny’s Adventures Through the Alphabet,”  which was  co-distributed  by San Francisco’s legendary  Last  Gasp Books until they discontinued their distribution wing after forty years in early  2017.  It’s still available on  O’Shea’s official  website, amazon, and about a dozen Bay Area book, novelty and record stores. 

For the time being, O’Shea’s world is all about THE GLORY HOLE.  “I knew taking on a TV series without a budget like this would be a massive undertaking, but now that I'm in the midst of it all, I’m pretty confident it's going to kill me. Totally worth it. And I'd sincerely like to thank everyone who’s helping me bring this little beast to life. They’re suffering for the art just as much as I am, and I truly appreciate everyone's contributions, no matter  how small. The first episode's been online for a few weeks and the response has been fantastic, so I'm optimistic that this thing will find an audience.”

THE GLORY HOLE will air on KCMC Comcast Channel 28 in Alameda County and AT&T U-Verse Channel 99 (select: Hayward Government Access) Friday nights at 11 pm, with re-airings on Sundays at 4:00 am and Tuesdays at 2:30 am.  KCMC will also begin live-streaming sometime in the summer, so those outside of the Bay Area will be able to watch online very soon. 

For the latest updates, be sure to 'Like' www.facebook.com/GloryHoleTV, and for more on Dave O'Shea's movies, coloring book and artwork, visit www.BlatantRipOff.com

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The GLORY HOLE

That’s right, kids!  The wait is almost over!!  The wait for what, you ask?  Oh, you know, that cable access TV show I’ve been quietly piecing together for the past couple months. 

On my previous post, I mentioned that I was taking a TV/film production course at Chabot college in Hayward.  Well, turns out that little college has a super fancy, high-tech television studio deep in its bowels and they operate and program a few tv stations out of it.  Long story short, one of the gentlemen in charge of the whole operation stumbled upon some of my video work (see previous post) and asked if I’d be interested in developing a show for one of their stations.  Making a TV show wasn’t even something I was thinking about.. at all, but this quickly seemed like a very simple “Yes” to me.

The deal was simple; I’d be given no budget (but underwriters could be sought for donations, as it’s a non-profit, government access station) but I was given complete creative control.. If you know my history, I’m obviously used to working without a budget at this point (which fucking SUCKS, but it is what it is), but to have no restrictions and, potentially, actual viewers (Gasp!!), too good to pass up.  So here we are, balls-deep in production on this unexpected new project.  And, yes, of course I had to call it THE GLORY HOLE.

Don’t wanna give too much away as far as what’s to come, but below is a sneak peek at the pilot episode, partially shot in Chabot’s television studio.  This one stars Philip Richardson (DAY JOB), Debra Lamb (POINT BREAK, WILD AT HEART, BEVERLY HILLS VAMP), Balrok Del Cavo (CREEPY KOFY MOVIETIME, PSYCHOTROPIC THEATER), Daniel Imani (TURBO DRIVE), and a troubled mannequin named Ruttegar.  Things will get shaken up quite a bit format-wise and there will likely be a revolving door of actors and performers over the course of the season, but if you enjoy this, chances are you’ll be very prepared for the next ones.  

As the end of the video mentions, this will be a weekly series airing Friday nights at 11 pm beginning June 2nd.  You can find it on KCMC Comcast channel 28 in Alameda County and on AT&T U-Verse channel 99 (select: Hayward) anywhere in California.  KCMC may be live-streaming online by June as well, check back for updates on how to watch.  If there’s enough interest, a DVD set may also be considered down the road.

In the meantime, please go ‘Like’ www.facebook.com/GloryHoleTV and Thanks for stopping by!  If you’re feeling charitable and wanna help out, we’re accepting donations via PAYPAL at thegloryholetv@gmail.com to help out with props, locations, feeding the performers and all that fun stuff.. Every little bit helps and we’ll mention you in the SPECIAL THANKS in the end credits. Feel free to shoot us an email there, too.  

Thanks for your interest and support, we appreciate YOU.

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Some New Nonsense

Been a while, kids. Grew some more grey hairs, ‘Merica (well, not the voters, but the insanely outdated Electoral College) elected a disturbingly unqualified, misogynist, racist, xenophobic, pathetic Twitter-tantrum-throwing conman for its leader, and I’m entering the final weeks of my first semester in a TV/Film Production course at a little college in the East Bay called Chabot .. some guy named Tom Hanks(?) went there.  Never heard of him but they tell me he’s a big deal.  He’s pretty cute, actually.

If you’re reading this, you may already know that I’ve been making low-to-no-budget little guerrilla films for over a decade now, but at the urging of a good friend, I finally took the leap from indie filmmaker no one’s heard of to film student no one’s heard of!!  Oh, and Fun Fact: I’m literally older than some of my classmates’ parents. True story. 

Below are a couple of video shorts I shot & edited for the class, happy to say the instructor seems to have a good sense of humour. 

First up is an interview with a classmate that went pretty well, indie filmmaking and useful info on AA eggs were the focus here:

And then there’s the most recent assignment, where we were instructed to create a music video using any song we wanted from the ‘80s (you can imagine the groans in the classroom when it was announced, being that the majority of them were born in the mid-to-late ‘90s and think Drake is music… but that’s a rant for another day). I was considering a variety of different artists  from the decade, Faith No More, Run-DMC, S.O.D., Sepultura, Sade, Tone-Loc, Ramones, Living Colour, etc., but, ultimately, I opted for the sexy and soothing “Sign Your Name” by the grossly under-appreciated Terence Trent D’Arby (who later changed his name to Sananda Maitreya).  The clip features a lot of folks you may recognize from my previous work like DAY JOB (Philip Richardson, Dell Manantan) and DAY AT THE BEACH  (Victoria Privates), along with some new faces that I’ll definitely be working with again in the future (Bridget Perez, Drake Blackmon, and others who’d prefer their name not be mentioned .. you’ll understand after you watch).  

So, without further ado, here’s the sweet, romantic, censored but still somewhat NSFW video I came up with. Grab some popcorn and make sure your vibrators have fresh batteries, you can thank me later.  

And lastly, since it IS the Holiday Season once again, I’ll now shamelessly plug my BILLY AND THE EASTER BUNNY coloring book again, available HERE (also here, here, here, and a bunch of other places).  Perfect stocking stuffer for the kids, also great for white elephant parties, bachelorette parties, first communions, funerals, basically ANY festive event you may be attending.

And here’s the full-length INFOMERCIAL if you really wanna torture yourself!

As always, THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!! I appreciate YOU.

More videos coming soon, stay tuned!!

Until we meat again . . . 

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Santa Cruz BOOK SIGNING

Hey Kids, come on down to Atlantis Fantasyworld in downtown Santa Cruz next Wed, May 11th!  I’ll be there selling & signing copies of Billy and the Easter Bunny coloring books as well as debuting the Day At The Beach / Blatant Rip Off: The Movie DVD. Lots of delicious bonus features on the discs as well.  And I’ll also be selling some old art prints.  Scroll down for more info, drop by and say hello if you’ll be in the area.  See ya!

Event Info: Local artist and award-winning indie filmmaker, Dave O'Shea, will be hanging out at Atlantis Fantasyworld at 1020 Cedar Street in Santa Cruz on Wednesday, May 11th from noon until 6. He’ll be signing copies of his new adult coloring book (heavy emphasis on adult), Billy and the Easter Bunny's Adventures Through the Alphabet, as well as selling art prints and DVDs of Day At The Beach, a short thriller filmed largely in Santa Cruz and an Official Selection of SF IndieFest's 2014 Another Hole in the Head Film Festival--the DVD also features the truly bizarre Blatant Rip Off: The Movie, which is “intended for drug addicts, scumbags, and suicide-cult enthusiests,” according to the sleeve.

O’Shea’s subversive, thought-provoking and often abrasive artwork has been featured in numerous underground art shows in San Francisco and Las Vegas over the past 12 years. Over a dozen of his colorful illustrations also graced the walls of the Black Light Room at Tad Morgan's infamous Ciao Bella Italian Restaurant in Ben Lomond from 2002 until its untimely demise in 2008. **Fun Fact: Ciao Bella was a prominently featured location in O’Shea’s critically acclaimed 2012 debut feature film, "DAY JOB". Owner Tad Morgan and a handful of other Ciao Bella alumni co-starred in the film, as well.

About the book: Billy and the Easter Bunny's Adventures Through the Alphabet is a unique adult coloring book/pseudo-graphic novel from the mind of San Francisco artist and independent filmmaker, Dave O'Shea. The story centers around Billy, a curious young boy who befriends the Easter Bunny after finding him showering in his parents' bathroom one day. In exchange for Billy keeping his mouth shut about breaking into his house, the Easter Bunny takes him on an educational journey through the alphabet, teaching him hundreds of fun words and valuable life lessons about the great, big world around them (through the Bunny's jaded and extremely cynical filter, of course). So join Billy and the Easter Bunny on this whimsical and unpredictable trek from A (Alien) to Z (Zen). You'll be glad you did.

**PARENTAL ADVISORY: Contains graphic images (including violence, nudity, the Clergy, etc.) and some uncomfortable truths, not recommended for children or adults.

For more about O’Shea’s art and film work, visit www.BlatantRipOff.com, and give a ‘Like’ at www.facebook.com/BillyandtheEasterBunny

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Psst..

Billy and the Easter Bunny’s ADVENTURES THROUGH THE ALPHABET is now being co-distributed by Legendary San Francisco publishers of all things underground, LAST GASP BOOKS!!  Extremely honored to be associated with these guys, now go BUY A COPY!! Dammit. 

And WATCH THE INFOMERCIAL, it just might save your life someday. 

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INFOMERCIAL TIME!!!

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Billy & the Easter Bunny-BUY IT NOW!!

I’m not saying you’ll DIE if you don’t buy one, but I’m not saying you Won’t die.  I’m no fortune teller … Better safe than sorry, right kids?

For your convenience, two versions of Billy and the Easter Bunny’s Adventures Through the Alphabet are available online at the Blatant Rip Off ETSY Store, and if you happen to be in San Francisco, you can find it at the following locations (more to come!):

Whatever Store 548 Castro St

Modern Times Bookstore 2919 24th St

Books Inc 2251 Chestnut St

Comix Experience 305 Divisadero St

The Beat Museum 540 Broadway

Alley Cat Books 3036 24th St

**The store pictured below has since pulled them from the shelves, apparently some of the employees found it “too dark” for their sensitive little souls.  Fucking millenials, man.

PS-we also have a snazzy facebook page now, be a pal and go give it a ‘Like’

www.facebook.com/BillyandtheEasterBunny

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Are YOU ready for ‘Billy and the Easter Bunny’s ADVENTURES THROUGH THE ALPHABET’??

That’s right, kids, THE LIES ARE TRUE!!!  While taking a break from shooting my new movie a few months back, I decided to not kill myself (for now) and spent some time in my secluded hideout writing and illustrating a ‘children’s book' … Just for YOU!!  It’s called BILLY AND THE EASTER BUNNY’S ADVENTURES THROUGH THE ALPHABET, catchy title, huh? 

Here’s the description fresh off the press release:

BILLY AND THE EASTER BUNNY’S ADVENTURES THROUGH THE ALPHABET is a unique adult coloring book / pseudo-graphic novel from the mind of San Francisco artist and award-winning independent filmmaker, Dave O'Shea.  The story centers around Billy, a curious young boy who befriends the Easter Bunny after finding him showering in his parents' bathroom one day.  In exchange for keeping his mouth shut about breaking into his house, the Easter Bunny takes Billy on an educational journey through the alphabet, teaching him hundreds of fun words and valuable life lessons about the great, big world around them (through the Bunny's jaded and extremely cynical filter, of course).  So join Billy and the Easter Bunny on this whimsical and unpredictable trek from A (Alien) to Z (Zen).  You'll be glad you did.  

**PARENTAL ADVISORY: Contains graphic images (including violence, nudity, the Clergy, etc.) and some uncomfortable truths.  Not recommended for children or adults.

That pretty much sums up the theme, a naive young boy named Billy learns the meanings of 26 words (in alphabetical order) from his extremely world-weary host, the Easter Bunny--who seems to be involved in some pretty freaky stuff during the rest of the year once Easter season’s over, apparently. 

But like everything I’ve created thus far (movies, artwork, this blog, etc.), it’s not terribly easy to describe in words.  Is it a coloring book?  Sure.  A graphic novel?  Sort of.  A children’s book?  Well, it looks like one.  The information in some of the Easter Bunny’s teachings may be a little too real for some parents, but if you ask me, you should buy copies for everyone you know, hand’m out at local grammar schools, PTA meetings, AA meetings, and especially at all of your neighborhood churches. GO NUTS!!  

**SPOILER ALERT** Here’s a sneak peak at some of the Easter Bunny’s informative lessons:

**END SPOILER**  

58 pages of pure bliss for the whole family … depending on the family.   

So, there you have it, kids.  A touching story of a young boy and a severely jaded talking bunny, page after page filled with priceless information that can literally SAVE YOUR LIFE, and hundreds of brand new, ready-to-color drawings!  

It gets even snazzier, kids.  Standard versions of the book are available to pre-order as well as a LIMITED SPECIAL EDITION version (both scheduled for release mid-January 2016).  The Special Edition will be limited to 50 copies, each individually numbered and signed along with a one-of-a-kind, original ‘WORD OF THE DAY’ sketch drawn on the back page.  Might even get some extra goodies in there with it, too (a hair, a toenail, a postcard, who knows?). 

PRE-ORDER YOURS TODAY!!  

COMING SOON to some very cool book and gift shops, as well as Amazon, Barnes & Noble and others.

PLEASE HELP SPREAD THE WORD!!!

And as always, thanks for stopping by!!  

[rantsofajerk]

DAY JOB Chronicles, Chapter 3:  Getting an indie movie seen is fucking hard

Finally taking a couple weeks off from shooting my second indie/guerrilla/DIY/fuck-me/this-is-a-nightmare/swore-I’d-never-do-this-to-myself-again feature ‘film’ (news on that one coming soon..ish), thought this would be a good time to get back to some long overdue bloggering. 

I’m holding off on Chapter 2 (the ‘making of’ portion) of the DAY JOB saga for now because if and when a DVD is released, I think the bonus features will cover how it all went down pretty well.  As of right now, due to music licensing & other legal mumbo-jumbo, the DAY JOB DVD is caught up in some red tape.  Hopefully agreements with the outside parties involved can be made someday and it'll finally get out into the world, but as of right now, things are uncertain.  Another sad reality of being an indie filmmaker who happens to not be independently wealthy.

So, it’s 2015 and my little movie I wrapped shooting in 2010 has still only been seen by a small group of people.  In April of 2011, I rented a theater and invited the cast, our families & friends to come check out an early cut.  It wasn’t quite audience-ready at the time, but using that night as an impromptu test-screening really helped me spot some of its glaring pacing issues and technical flaws, so I went back in and recut it for the 53rd time. 

Then I started submitting the trimmed-down version to film festivals.  I knew nothing of how to go about this, but learned early on that the film fest world is every bit as incestuous and sleazy as Hollywood itself, filled with politics, back-scratching and everything else I am absolutely not in this for.  It was pretty enlightening (and more than a little bit nauseating) when I slowly figured out how this bullshit game is played.  For example, for the “prestigious” festivals like Sundance and Cannes, they demand a world premiere of your film.  This means that, if you’re a sucker like me and don’t realize these elitist snobs won’t even watch a film submitted by an unknown without household-name celebrities in the cast, they charge twice as much as most other festivals AND make you wait to not be accepted before you’re allowed to submit elsewhere, to avoid disqualification.  Now, if I knew then what I know now, obviously I would’ve saved my money (and about 9 months) and skipped the big festivals and went right for the smaller ones, but instead I wasted money I didn’t have, waited, and of course, was rejected. 

All in all, I submitted DAY JOB to probably 25 festivals worldwide, from horror festivals to mainstream to underground to sci-fi/B-movie, anywhere I thought it had a chance.  Not only did I spend nearly a year getting one rejection letter after another after another, a handful of these bitch ass festivals didn’t even bother sending a rejection (after taking my money and likely not watching the movie).  They’d just post their line-ups and I’d have to scroll through to not see it on the lineup.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I thought DAY JOB deserved to be screened at all or even a third of these festivals, but is an email saying “thanks for submitting, we’re gonna pass” too much to ask?  Lazy pricks.

The whole process was pretty gross, and the more I learned about how most of these festivals operate--including the FACT that judges and programmers generally watch about 5 minutes of any film they haven’t heard of before deciding if they’ll bother finishing it--the more I wished I'd saved every dollar I spent on submission fees and used that money to put it out myself or just go make another movie.  

But I was stubborn and believed in this weird little movie.  I honestly thought film festivals, especially the horror and exploitation type, would want to program something a little ‘out there’ like DAY JOB, something unique that their audiences hadn’t seen 1000 times before.  I could not have been more wrong.  I’d see the programming lists come out, one after the next, and they all pretty much looked the same.  In 2011/2012, True Blood was still pretty popular, so about a third of the lineups would be vampire movies.  Shitty, forgettable vampire movies you still haven’t heard of.  Zombies were making a big comeback thanks to The Walking Dead, too, so there’d be lots and lots of zombie movies.  Shitty, forgettable zombie movies, even worse than the vampire ones.  Found-footage was continuing to oversaturate the indie scene (if you want to know my feelings on this particular sub-genre, click here), so a bunch of “Blair Witch Project” rip-offs would be programmed.  It really opened my eyes to the reality that film festival world had pretty much adopted Hollywood’s mentality of ‘spoon feed the dummies, show them what they’ve already seen… they like that.’  

In the meantime, I’d sent screeners out to numerous horror websites and magazines, and unlike a lot of the festivals, some of them actually watched it, and even more surprising, some pretty damn good reviews started coming in. If interested, below are a few of the less-spoilery ones: 

LA Horror, Foul Feast, Dread Central 

However, positive reviews aside, it was becoming more and more evident that DAY JOB probably wasn’t going to fit in anywhere, film festival-wise.  It was far too ‘horror’ for mainstream festivals, not ‘horror’ enough for horror festivals, too ‘artsy’ for exploitation … I even heard from one horror festival programmer that he thought some of the violence would be too disturbing for their audiences.  At a HORROR festival.  Fuck me.

After about a year and a half (no joke) having every festival pass, and just when I thought it was dead and ready to be buried, I saw DAY JOB listed on Pollygrind Underground Film Festival’s 2012 program.  Unbelievable.  Somebody had actually watched my movie and was willing to let their precious, sensitive audience watch it?  Took about a day to sink in that I hadn’t imagined it.

Pollygrind was a tiny, truly independent film festival festival run, literally, by one man, Chad Clinton Freeman [after its 5th festival in 2014, Pollygrind is currently on hiatus indefinitely, which is why I say “was”].  The audience was almost exclusively other indie filmmakers, like me, whose work had been shunned by most other festivals.  There was a palpable, unspoken camaraderie in the room, watching each others’ work, rooting for each other.  No different when I went back in 2014 as a spectator, something really special about this event Chad had created.  Most importantly, for me, this was the first time I was watching DAY JOB with strangers.  People who wouldn’t be biased to like or dislike the movie based on knowing me or anyone involved.  It was pure.   And it played just like I had hoped.  They laughed where I hoped they would, cringed where I hoped they would, and everyone was a little shell-shocked when it was over (none moreso than my own mother, who showed up even though I warned her that doing so would be a terrible idea … but, like me, she’s stubborn).  The fact that Chad had the balls to show this weird ass movie gave me a renewed sense of hope.  Maybe there actually could be an audience out there for my oddball brand of ‘horror.’  

Then, almost immediately, another film festival took a chance on it, this one in my own hometown.  San Francisco IndieFest’s horror festival Another Hole in the Head, one of the longest running American genre festivals decided my sick little movie belonged in their lineup, and it was given the coveted 11 pm slot on their opening weekend.  This was truly a beautiful thing. 

Like the Pollygrind screening a month before, the Another Hole in the Head screening was a hit.  As strange and unpleasant as DAY JOB is, clearly this was the audience I had made it for; the outcasts, the weirdos, the people who’ll go to an 11 pm screening for a movie they’d never heard of on a rainy November night who truly DO want to see something they weren’t expecting.  

Easily my fondest memories of this era were from that particular weekend.  During the Q & A immediately following the screening, one gentleman asked “What’s wrong with you?,” the next night I was called up onstage during another filmmaker’s Q & A (none other than legendary Canuxploitation director Barry J. Gillis) who, for reasons unknown, insisted on talking about DAY JOB rather than his own film, and in the lobby of the theater (I believe it was the following night) when an audience member came up and asked “are you, like, a nice, well-adjusted person?” Again, further reassurance there was (and is) an audience for movies like this.  I mean, a grown man found the movie so convincing and disturbing, he worried I may actually be dangerous.  High praise, indeed. 

And just as quickly as things had turned around with the incredible screenings and all the positive feedback … the crickets returned.  

Aaaand now I’m at the part of this blog where I try to remember if there was a point I was trying to make in writing this. I’m sure there was, and it was probably some ‘hang in there/don’t give up/follow your dreams no matter what’ kind of bullshit, but guess what?  I’m hungry.

So, there ya go, kids. Stay away from drugs.  Wait, no. Do ALL the drugs. Go nuts.  DAY JOB Chronicles, Chapter 4 coming eventually … maybe Chapter 2, as well.  We’ll see.  Thanks for stopping by.  And definitely go check out my short films on Reelhouse if you haven’t already.  MUCH appreciated.

[rantsofajerk]

DAY AT THE BEACH on VOD

My 15 minute short film DAY AT THE BEACH, starring a couple sexy young vixens and a big creep is available to rent or own NOW.  See this previous blog for more info, and thanks for your support!  Seriously. 

WATCH IT HERE: www.reelhouse.org/blatantripoff

[rantsofajerk]

BLATANT RIP OFF (the movie)

What’s that?  You say you’re tired of all your entertainment looking and sounding too polished and perfect?  Sick of tedious plot-lines and boring dialogue? Tired of animation created by skilled animators and music composed & performed by musicians familiar with their instruments?  Well, you’re in luck, fella.  My 45-minute experimental bucket of bizarre is here to flush away your blues and infiltrate your psyche like bloated brain-scabies.

That’s right, the immortal BLATANT RIP OFF (the movie) is available NOW.  

Check it out, you can thank me later.

Order HERE: https://www.reelhouse.org/blatantripoff/blatant-rip-off-the-movie

The VOD premiere of DAY AT THE BEACH is up next, pre-orders coming soon. Stay tuned.

[rantsofajerk]

Although we wish them nothing but the best going forward, I’ve decided to pull my short DAY AT THE BEACH from the “Paranoia Tapes” anthology.  The good news?  It's coming to VOD soon.  Stay tuned.