One Sunny Day

One sunny day in late 2008, I got a call from an 18 year old guy called Nick, asking if I wanted to play a lead role in a 'webseries' (a WHAT?) he was putting together with his friend Sophie. He called it OzGirl. The role might have some crude elements – would I be OK with that? Oh, and we’d be shooting pretty much ASAP. So, the decision: to stay in Melbourne a little longer to put down this project, or forego this bizarre ‘web’ thing (it was probably porn anyway) and stick with my original plan to move to LA that year? Apart from having worked with Nick in the past and knowing what he was capable of, my instinctively good feeling about the project was kind of inexplicable.

It was a couple of months later and still sunny. Shoots and other production goodness/frivolity had passed by us pretty quickly. We were winding down at Nick’s sometime after posting the first video, when Nick informed us that we got our first “comment.”

What, from someone we knew? friends? parents? Nope. Nick explained that the comment had come from the same community of fans that supported lonelygirl15 (and, at request, he repeated his explanation of what exactly lonelygirl15 was – I listened properly that time). From that point on, I was totally enthralled – who were these people and what made them want to follow our show?

I didn’t properly realize it at that point in time, but we’d just struck a gold mine of awesomeness – this would be the community of supporters that would carry us through to LA and beyond. It wasn’t long before the legendary peeps from Anchorcove, LG15Today and other exciting corners of the internet had accepted us into their impressive roster of webseries-to-watch. The level of support (and honest critique, where called for) that this community offered us and our show was unrelenting and completely blew me away. It still does. I sincerely believe that these people played a vital role in getting us and OzGirl to where we are today, therefore I cannot thank them (you) enough.

And now? To be here in LA, gearing up for the 2010 Streamy Awards amongst such an amazing, talented, supportive bunch of people is pretty surreal. I wish everybody involved all the very best, and congratulate you on every success to date. Having the chance to be included in such company is an honor. To remember that we are at the very beginning of a twist in entertainment evolution, headed up by such multi-tasking geniuses, doubles that honor. And having just come back to finish this little essay the morning after WINNING our very own Streamy Award for Best Foreign Webseries… well, I’m really just lost for words, and will awkwardly conclude with a gigantic, Ayers Rock-sized, koala-shaped THANK YOU!

-Shanrah Wakefield