Harnessing the power of new storytellers for film and stage, developing original bespoke films based on UGC.
With Los Angeles production company Some Assembly Required LA’s flagship project “Dare: LA,” audience suggestions decided what the company’s next show would be about. Using a custom website and social media, thousands of prompts were gathered from audiences in the form of a dare:
The website allowed visitors to vote on which prompts they liked most. Writers and actors signed up to join the project using the website. Then our socials and an email announced which ten selected prompts would be featured in the next company event.
Prospective writers had one week to write a 5-page scene inspired by any of the ten prompts. Then came the public staged readings:
Draft Night
At the company’s black box theatre space in North Hollywood, prospective actors showed up to meet the prospective writers (and meet the company’s assembled veteran directors, artists, and past writers). The new writers with their sample pages mingled and “drafted” actors to do cold staged readings of their scenes. These were auditions for both writer and actor.
Using our custom website, all participants voted on which eight writers would be drafted to the main stage. These drafted writers had won the chance to create the one acts and short films which Some Assembly Required would produce in one month. In some cases, the company requested that the sample scene from Draft Night be expanded upon into a full script.
For each prompt, one writer was selected to write a play, and one writer was selected to write a film.
Crew Night
The company worked with the chosen writers to help them cast their shorts. The company put together eight production teams from the Draft Night participants. Teams were led by company members (such as our experienced sound designers, cinematographers, lighting designers). In some cases, directors were brought in to help non-directing writers tell their stories.
At a private company event, the production teams assembled, notes were given, and productions were put on their feet. In some cases, actors or writers were cast into the role of crew for one of the productions.
The production teams then finished their scripts (with guidance if necessary) and began shooting or rehearsing their shorts. The main production staff of the company coordinated with each team for permits, venues, securing locations, props, costumes, and more.
Premiere Night
The show. For each prompt, a play was staged for the live audience…and then a movie screen unrolled to present a completely different story inspired by the exact same prompt. An hour and a half later, with 8 shorts premiered, the audience was invited to offer their own suggestions about what they wanted the company’s next shorts to be about… in the form of a dare. 
٠ Led creative development of original content across genres. Developed shorts into TV series bibles, film treatments, full-length scripts for repackaging, festivals, and sale.
٠ Built an online content development pipeline to process UGC stories and revisions digitally – in collaboration with internal and external partners, producing award-winning films.
٠ Managed the creative calendar and led the writing room of a 10-person team that developed UGC into multiple award-winning short films and plays leveraging online organizing tools.