UK Comedian and filmmaker Lemon Otter has made a name for herself as a YouTube star. We caught up with the beaut Brit to find out about her plans to invade America.
YouTube has produced many stars, do you think it’s definitely helped your career?
It’s a fabulous way to easily get our wares out to the world, but there’s just so much on YouTube that the world is inundated with choice. It’s hard to get noticed as a result, but as a film maker it’s definitely a great tool to have access to.
Do you think if Monty Python were only just beginning they’d be following a similar path to you – putting their skits online?
Yes, it’s a different world now. In order to work in comedy in the 60s, you needed to be at Oxford or Cambridge, and in the footlights. From there, the BBC would offer you a proper job, writing, editing or performing. Nowadays it’s all Comedy Blaps, Funny or Die, little tiny bits of filmed comedy dotted about online. But definitely, Terry Jones would have a camera on his phone, and the others would be dressed as Pepperpots, filming in the High Street without permission – just like us.
How do you come up with the ideas for these sketches?
Hine. The state you find yourself in when you intend to have a bath and eat some food then alas its quarter to midnight and you’ve…. done… nothing. Ideas come to us, basically, whilst we’re wasting time. The characters are often based on real people we’ve met- they’re exaggerated- but they still come from real people. Sam might pull a face, or we might start doing voices, and a character emerges. We keep a Bog Book (a book in the toilet) for drawing cartoons and noting down inventions. Quite a lot of funny ideas come about from sitting in hine, on the loo.
Have you a favourite sketch?
We always like the sketch we’ve just made! Then once it’s online we forget about it and move onto the next one. We rarely watch them back as we’re usually too pre-occupied with whatever’s in the pipeline next. (I’ve stopped talking about toilets now).
What’s the next step for your troupe?
We’ve just finished a feature film called ‘Boogaloo’ and have the premiere of that in October. We’re already planning the third part in the Nile/Fallopia/Jacaster trilogy, and are filming a new sketch about a very sad fellow called Carl Runt whose hobby is going on first dates and attempting to fit pizzas into his lunchbox. Other than that, we’re looking to find someone in TV who can take us safely under their wing and help us reach a wider audience – if anyone likes what we do and thinks they can assist, they should get in touch! www.thoncolinfilms.co.uk
