Creator Q+A with Rachel Samples: From creative director to creator comedian
AAPI creators & YouTube’s Neal Mohan
The Pope does 6-7, a dog’s Meta glasses POV and Throbchella
Illustration by Annelise Capossela/For The Washington Post; iStock
Creators rewrite the punchline
Creators have disrupted comedy — from the talent pipeline, to the types of jokes being told, to the projects being pursued.
While there’s been much written about how creators have disrupted the larger entertainment industry, comedian creators in particular are charting new paths to success through social media’s algorithms. One only needs to look at last week’s Netflix is a Joke Festival, which featured many acts who straddle the roles of creator and comedian, and was described by the New York Times as ruled by “the attention economy.”
Comedians today are “building their own platform, and they're not beholden to the same sort of gatekeepers that traditional Hollywood was once held by,” said UTA Creators agent A.J. Leone.
With social media, the entry point to comedy has changed. Even the definition of a comic has become nebulous, said Danny Frenkel, co-founder and CEO of Punchup Live, a site designed to help comedians connect directly with their audiences. “It's not the same system where you need to get good at open mics, so that then a booker will see you, so then you'll get stage times that then you can sell tickets. It's totally different now.”…
The Takeover: How creators flexed their power this week.
🎭Creators made the main stage at TV’s upfront pitches — not just YouTube’s
🎬 Markiplier’s ‘Iron Lung’ set for May 31 YouTube debut
🍋 Lyrical Lemonade dropped a LLTV teaser of new shows launching next week
🥘 Keith Lee’s FamiLee Day festival drew 20,000 to New Orleans
🤰 Alex Cooper is pregnant, expecting first baby with husband Matt Kaplan
🐊 Clavicular reached a deal in alligator shooting case
⚽ TikTok and FIFA introduced their World Cup creator correspondents
💰 Cannes Lions’ creator boom meets expense account agony
Creator Q+A
Courtesy of Rachel Samples
Rachel Samples is a Los Angeles-based comedian and creator. Before going full-time as a creator, she worked in the industry as a creative director. This interview has been edited and condensed.
Dylan Wells: You have an untraditional path into the creator space — tell me about your origin story and the transition from the corporate world to becoming a creator.
Rachel Samples: I was always that kid who was making sketches and bits with the camcorder and doing videos with friends.
I went to school for TV and film, and was doing some sketches, improv there. I loved it so much, but definitely was fed this sort of path of corporate, the corporate journey. I got to LA and started at an agency that was actually focused on branded content and campaigns for creators. So this was like my bread and butter in my nine-to-five, and then I was still having these little blips, especially in the pandemic, of making sketches, flexing characters and doing things, but it was always this back burner to the back burner.
Then, like many people in 2020, you have that one video that just tears off. You have this internal awakening of like, “Wait, wait. Do I need to be more consistent and take this more seriously?”
So from that moment, it was May 2021, I really focused on consistency. TikTok loves when you hit that joke again, again, again. And trying to understand, like, what do I enjoy doing? What am I able to do in between work calls for 15 minutes? What can I quickly execute myself? And then it got to this point in the summer of 2023 [clients] were like, “I love your videos.” And that was such a shiny thing for the agency I worked for, our “in-house creator who's pitching you.”
I left my full-time ad-agency job in summer of 2023 with the hope of doing content full time. I've not looked back since, and I'm just unbelievably happy. It's a ride, for sure, but I'm so happy I took that leap. I've never, ever regretted it.
The Platforms
LinkedIn wants to host up to 4,000 events featuring creators a year
YouTube goes all-in on creator shows, pitches itself as the future of media
Instagram introduced Instants for unfiltered, in the moment photos
X launched an ad product to connect brands and creators
YouTube, Snap and TikTok settle school district's social media addiction claims
The Group Chat: More creator news from my notebook.
AAPI CREATOR CULTURE: The Asian American Foundation gathered more than 100 top creators at its heritage month summit in New York City last week — a strategic embrace as TAAF CEO Norman Chen said that while Asian Americans are shaping culture and conversation more than ever before, Americans still have limited knowledge of their history, influence, and everyday experiences. Chen said he believes creators “will play a significant role in introducing the general public, especially younger generations,” to the community.
The organization’s annual report found just seven percent of U.S. adults believe Asian American and Pacific Islander communities have “a great deal” of influence on the nation’s culture.
Last year’s report found young people 16-24 years old cited TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube as the top three sources they use to get information about AAPIs.
According to this year’s study, AAPIs are perceived as having the most influence on the food and restaurant industry, followed by the online/gaming/digital content industry and the movies/TV industry.
I attended the organization’s creator and talent welcome dinner at COQADOQ, the Summit’s Awards Dinner (where creators lauded award-recipient YouTube CEO Neal Mohan), and the AAPI All-Star Basketball Game. I was impressed by how many of the biggest Asian creators from around the country were in attendance — to name just a few for sense of scale: Samir Chaudry, Alan Chikin Chow, Leenda Dong, Cassey Ho, Michelle Khare, Chriselle Lim, Adrian Per, Sean Sotaridona, David Suh, Philip Wang, and Jeenie Weenie.
One hot topic of debate and gossip during the events? If the “Wasian meet ups” around the country last week were a celebration of community or reductive and exclusionary, and if the term “Wasian” or “hapa” or “mixed” or none of the above is best to describe the mixed race Asians.
Close Friends: Content I sent my friends this week.
Series I can’t stop watching: @vaderrthegolden’s videos of a golden retriever’s POV wearing Meta glasses and @audreyinreallife’s series on her childhood growing up isolated from the real world.
This week I listened to: Boy Throb’s new song “DJ Turn it Down” live at Throbchella at the Bowery Ballroom (more on that to come) and SOFI TUKKER at Spotify and Peloton’s event to celebrate the launch of Fitness with Spotify.
The next big account: I’ve been loving watching the @4inthe5 and this week’s copycat @4thegirlsatl launch confirms they’re onto something.
This week I was influenced to: add new stickers to my phone and attend my first basketball game (thanks to some IRL influencing by Milan Mathew).
PR package that broke through: Ulta’s box of butterflies.
Sparked joy: this sleeping baby skunk and Pope Leo doing 67.
What should we be covering? Drop us a line by replying to this email, or follow me at @dylanewells. If this email was forwarded to you, click here to subscribe.
