This was originally posted on cpluscomedy.com in 2020.
YouTube is a fickle beast. One minute, it’s the place where anyone can be a star. The next, intense rules are put in place, affecting the monetary gains of creators on the platform. Now it’s not the only user generated video platform on the scene.
Christian A. Pierce is probably one of the most recognizable names from YouTube in terms of longevity. He and his creative partner, Jimmy Tatro, got in on the service while it was still figuring itself out. After amassing tens of millions of views on their home platform, the guys moved to Facebook Watch where their ideas can be expanded upon. The latest season of Real Bros. of Simi Valley just landed on the service to rave views. Pierce and I had a chat just before the premiere.
What’s it like [on the Facebook campus]?
Christian A. Pierce: Pretty hip. It’s got some startup vibes. The full course kitchen was the best part. I enjoyed a little take home lunch.
Is that your first time being there since you guys started working with them?
Christian A. Pierce: No, we’ve been back for a couple of meetings. We haven’t been able to like enjoy it as much as we did today.
But they treat you right. I assume they treat you really well.
Christian A. Pierce: Oh yeah. They’re great. It’s really cool.
Nice. Have you been enjoying this new press circuit going on?
Christian A. Pierce: Is it been fun so far. We were on the news with LA news yesterday, which was funny. Everyone keeps mispronouncing Jimmy’s name wrong, which is also funny.
They can’t say Tatro?!
Christian A. Pierce: The can’t say it. You did it right! First time. Yeah. We did like five interviews today and not one person said it right.
I say it right because I’ve known about you guys [for a while]. I’ve been following, especially Jimmy’s career, for the past couple of years since he was in 22 Jump Street and the YouTube scene. I think it should be respectable that people should know the name at least by now.
Christian A. Pierce: I agree. Especially when like you reminded them before the interview and they still mess it up.
Now that you guys have been doing this type of stuff, was it like this when the channel first hit it big, when Jimmy’s channel first started blowing up. Was it you guys doing interviews and press? I know YouTube is a different beast than compared to a stand up and television.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah, no, it wasn’t always the same way. I think it took a little bit of time before even YouTube with any legitimize in that sense. We can [now] get that kind of attention from those kinds of publications.
But now everything for YouTube has changed. Now everybody can be a star in a sense. And now YouTube used to be a wild, wild west where a bunch of people were making money. A certain set of creators were making money and now it’s just changing without warnings. If [videos] have children in it, you can’t make money off of it. There’s all these weird rules and it’s good in a sense that you guys -- not jump ship -- but you guys shifted focus from YouTube to a wide range of things.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah. I think it was pretty good timing. Not to say that we’re completely done with YouTube forever. But you know the timing of switching into like a series format that not a different network where we’re backed financially.
It couldn’t have been better timing, honestly. But I mean, I can’t hate on these kids these days that get paid for the dollars to feel like I was on camera. I would’ve loved being one of those kids.
I don’t understand how you find a niche like that and how that blows up. In the past, it was you either review stuff or you make funny stuff and that’s it. But now it’s just this whole conglomerate. I think YouTube is a tough place to navigate.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah. Like there’s a channel for everyone -- no matter what you’re in to.
How has the transition been for going into Facebook watch? Has it been something of a smooth process now that you have that financial backing, that security, the ability to make bigger stories?
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah. No, it’s been great. It definitely was a bit a learning curve. I think you said it perfectly. The fact that we can have our creativity back now... We can let our imaginations run a little bit more wild. I don’t have to worry about how we’re going to make these things happen. It’s a great feeling. It’s a lot more fun throughout the process. It’s a lot bigger, which we always wanted. Which also means bigger problem within bigger roadblocks.
But Facebook, as a [platform], has been great. It’s been cool to just see our audience… They’re responding to what we’re putting out because of the transparency that have.
I thought about this when I was watching a couple episodes of [Real Bros of Simi Valley]. You guys weren’t partnered with YouTube for the first couple of seasons, but now you’re actually partnered with Facebook Watch for doing the show.
Are they like Netflix in the sense that they don’t give you harsh notes or anything. And are you able to let the stories flow or are they a little bit constricting in telling you what you’re allowed?
Christian A. Pierce: They’ve been cool and they’re great about like trusting us and trusting our creative direction with the things. The seeds we planted with our characters and the stories in season one.
They do have notes on my thing that we turned in -- the cuts we finished, the drafts we finished. They are involved but, at the end of the day, they trust us to make the decision on what creative is going to end up on the screen, which is cool.
I was watching some of your interview with Grace Helbig. I know you the write and produce and star on the show. But, even though you have more of a crew now and it’s gone from 10 people to how ever many dozens of people making the show. What’s it been like? Have you been able to alleviate some of the stress of producing and writing the show? Are you able to explore your character a little bit more? Or has it been just as much as just as stressful? Because now you have all of these eyes watching on a very popular online show.
Christian A. Pierce: I would say it’s more stressful, like for both of us. The stakes are higher. It’s like a double edged sword. Like I said… Facebook has our back.
Are we gonna make these big ideas happen at the same time. If you take your foot off the gas in any one of those lanes -- the writing, the acting, the directing and producing -- then you’re not going to end up with a final product you want. And that’s just going to make us angry. It’s more stressful in the process now because things are bigger.
But that’s just going to turn into a better product. And we’re just as involved if not more involved in every facet. When it comes down to choosing the wardrobe for your character, it’s like we have our hands in everything.
There’s one thing I really love about your jump from YouTube to Facebook and now to online stardom is that now you’re getting recognized as somebody who can do this exemplary work. Work that stands out among the rest. Now you have like a deals with Quibi, for instance. How’s that show coming along? I assume you’re hard at work on that too.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah, we are. That was another series we started on our YouTube channel.
The first video is Sixth Grade Sleepovers. We did a few different suburb videos and Fifth Grade Recess. The series we’re writing for Quibi is based off of that series. And Jimmy just actually acts in a Quibi series. We’re both pretty excited for where we just had a platform to see what they can do.
What we’ve written, we’re very proud of and they’re ideas that we’ve been for a long time. The opportunity to get them out and get them out to a bigger audience with, once again, the backing to make these visions come to life. Super exciting.
I think that that’s really cool because Quibi 10 minutes long for an episode. So it’s introducing big stars who may have not have done YouTube stuff to be able to do this -- YouTube style stuff but for TV money. It’s also bringing together you guys, the YouTube people, in to the world of television, a world that maybe like on a lot of you may not have been able to jump into.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah. It’s interesting because in this journey, we’ve seen a lot of new digital networks come and go with their own take on like what the next wave of stories are going to be. None of them had been as original as Quibi’s take on the whole thing.
To put traditional entertainment backing into a shorter bite size format, we think is a great idea with traditional talent. We tend to say “YouTube talent” but I don’t think it’s all YouTube talent. Because I had just said like some YouTube talented kids making Legos or make up tutorials and that doesn’t seem like the kind of stuff you’re going to see on Quibi, which is cool.
It’s more people who have stories to tell and are saying that way. Yeah, I think it can be. I guess you could call that.
Speaking of stories to tell you have a new animated show and that come and that’s coming with the graphic novel as well. How far along are you on that? What’s your process for tackling that? I assume that’s going to be way different than the stuff you’re doing with Jimmy.
Christian A. Pierce: Yeah, it is. We’re in the beginning stages of it right now. There’s a lot of facets to it. I didn’t want to really do a lot with this character in this world. Right now we’re, fleshing out the entire backstory of the world of this character whose name is Astro.
It’s more like a comic book series -- I guess a graphic novel, someone that kind of like passing through that threshold. All the art is great so far. Now it’s just really getting the story down.
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