And Then Somehow... THIS Happened

Jason Smith is the grinning bald guy seen here in the middle at a recent Mortified show. The other people are awesome, too. But more on them in a sec.

Once upon a time, Jason was a starry-eyed Minnesotan teenager who wrote a short script inspired by the cinematic gem that is Days of Thunder with the hopes of it someday attracting Hollywood names. Years later, the adult Jason realized his script actually sucked-- pretty hard in fact-- and decided to do a reading of it in Mortified. Not ones to let him down, we decided to fulfill his younger self's dreams.

So we secretly invited a few of our very favorite actors to join Jason (not an actor) in a live reading of his teenage racetrack masterpiece 500 Miles to Indy.

And amazingly, they agreed. Behold, the Mortified Community Players featuring (from left to right) James Denton, Curtis Armstrong, Kevin McDonald, Elijah Wood and Busy Philipps. And yes, we are just as confused as you.

Adding to the fun, we decided not to promote this (or any of the night's many surprises) ahead of time. Our way of giving our fans a treat, thanking them for 4 years of fantastic support.

The result was a surreal experience for Jason, for us, and presumably anyone else who is a total spaz for Kids in the Hall, Freaks & Geeks, Better Off Dead, Desp. Housewives or things involving Hobbits.

More info on the rest of this event, its other fun surprises, and why Neil Katcher is such an awesome producing partner who I totally forgot thank on stage because I am a schmuck, coming soon.

Mortified Does a Hit of E

Greetings. Mortified's how-to-be-an-amateur-press-whore tour continues. E!
included Mortified on tonight's Daily 10 in their 411 section.

It will air:

-Tuesday Dec 19 @ 730pm and 1130pm
-Wednesday Dec 20 @ 830am and 1230pm

No interviews or clips as far as I know... but it's a good plug & repeats
several times. Thought I'd share the fun.

If you live in St. Louis, listen to KMOX next week too. Onion AV Club also ran a very nice piece on Mortified too that is online. We hope to have our press clip page finally updated in Jan 2007. But for now, enjoy these makeshift updates.

Confessions of a Amateur Press Whore

So it's week 1 of the the book tour. And I can't stress enough how appreciative we are of all the amazing support people are showing. From fans to media and beyond. Here's a rundown of some places you can spot us over the holiday season.

Entertinament Weekly (we made #3 on the Must List!)
Daily Candy
Geraldo at Large
Today Show
Jane
Glamour
Esquire
LA Weekly
Onion AV
NY Post
Talk of the Nation
Here & Now
Reuters
Washington Examiner
CoolHuntings
Boston Globe Magazine
Chicago Tribune
Fox Morning News (detroit)
KLKX
& a bunch more

including... this one...


KQED Writers Block
Listen to their podcast.

All of which is to say thanks again for contantly rocking our world.

Dave & Mortified Staff

Le Today Show

T-minus several minutes for before I leave for ye olde 30 Rock. Or is it Studio 60. I forget these days.

Anyway, a free Mortified shirt goes to the person who correctly predicts just how many seconds in it will take before I accidentally puke on Al Roker due to nervousness. My wager? 6.

See ya on TV.

Dahveed

-
ps: until we update our website's press page, check out the fun that went down here:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15852593
-

Mortified Reborn

Light up your Jesus candles! Mortified has officially become born again!

We're back from a major blog hiatus in order to unleash the following new and improved Mortified goodies. Now loaded with even more tasty angst!

We've got a new book, a new website (thanks Dan!) and tah dah... even our debut animated short!

The animated project is one that we've been wanting to launch for a long, long time now. We're thrilled with the result and hope you are too. The short is directed by Bill Barmisnki, an acclaimed multimdia artist who has done pretty stellar work for names like Baz Luhrmann, Absolut, The Damned and now... Mortified.

To view the short, you can see it on MySpace, YouTube etc. And it can also be seen on the Mortified Short Bus.

Enjoy.

- Dave, Neil, Giulia, Scott, Brandy, Annette, Abby, Heather, Krista, Anne, Shay, Jenny and Everyone at Mortified

Celebrate Mortified's 4th Birthday!

Help celebrate four years of unbridled angst with the grassroots phenomenon that is Mortified!

Yes, this September, the longest running stage show of its kind turns four years old! Crazy, eh? Just think, in just a few more years, it will start sprouting hair in funny places and be able to attend its very own events. So what are you waiting for? Buy your tickets. Tell your friends!

PLUS! As a special birthday bonus treat to our devoted fans... all Mortified shows nationwide in September will giving away cool b-day gifts. How's it work? Simple! If you happen to hear your actual birthday mentioned as a date in one of the journal entries being read during our show, flash us your ID afterwards and we’ll hook you up with some cool Mortified merch or other retro prizes.

It's our way of thanking you for four amazing years of unprecedented success and totally bitchin' support.

In angst we trust.

This Plug Is Not Yet Rated

Congrats to documentary filmmaker (and Mortified superfan) Eddie Schmidt who has produced an awesome new movie opening this weekend. How awesome? So much so that we're using this space to tell you about it.

It's called "This Film Is Not Yet Rated"is produced by IFC and was a big hit at Sundance. If you are looking for a movie to see this weekend, we highly encourage you to see this. There are no snakes. Or planes for that matter. But there are tons of great interviews with people like John Waters, Darren Aronofsky, Mario Bello, and Matt Stone. It's a smart, surreal and very funny peek into the strangely secret world of America's movie rating board.

If we were still brooding teenagers, this is the kind of 'adult supervision suggested' film we'd have totally snuck into.

- Mr. Mortified

The United States of Angst

Since launching Mortified many years ago, we've expanded to tons of cities playing to nonstop sold-out rooms. Suddenly, we're everywhere. Here's an update on our latest news from our ever-growing empire of angst.

Mortified Boston moves to its new home -- The Paradise -- on September 27. It's a great venue, great location and we are psyched to be coming there.

Mortified Chicago hits Oct 18 at the infamous Green Mill. We've been in Chicago for a several months digging up truly amazing pieces. We're so excited to finally share them with everyone. The venue is famous for being a favorite hang for Al Capone (wonder if kept a journal?) as well being the official home of poetry slams. Thus, with the addition of Mortified, they're now the home of good poetry... and really bad poetry.

Mortified LA returns from summer vacation Monday September 25 @ King King in Hollywood. We've been stockpiling lots of amazing new stuff to unleash for this event. Excited for the triumphant return.

Mortified NYC is taking a rare month off but tickets are alreayd selling for our Sept 20 show. Our event with This American Life filming us was a huge hit and we can't wait for it to air.

Mortified SF is roaring as usual. October shows are already on sale. If you want to attend, we always suggest people buy tickets ahead of time to our MakeOut Room events, as they are always packed and the venue is often forced to turn away people. Luckily, we do two shows there.

All specific details/times/tickets are coming super soon. Stay tuned -- read this blog, join our list or visit our ticketing page.

This American Life TV Show Taping

So This American Life has a TV show coming to Showtime in 2007. And they will be taping part of our July 26 Mortified NYC show. The segment will feature Mortified's favorite former debaucherer Sascha Rothchild reading the same super-slutty journals that appeared on their NPR radio show a few years ago. In fact, this same exact journal (plus lots more) will be featured in our upcoming book, Mortified: Real Words Real People Real Pathetic. True tales. Ripped from the pages of real life.

As usual, the event already sold out however there will likely be space for those who want to take their chances @ the door. As addeded incentive, we will have 3 performers from our LA show performing in NYC this month. Beyond Sascha, there's David Nadelberg reading a poem that recently won the coveted title during Mortified's popular Bad Teen Poetry Slam segment in San Fan, where the audience votes for the very worst. But much much better is the holy-shit-hilarious camping journals of Masha Tivyan. Her piece is among our all time favorites. A truly fascinating piece.

Speaking of the west coast, THIS SUNDAY we will doing a FREE (and somewhat more family friendly) mini version of Mortifed at the San Fran Theater Festival. Our first ever outdoor show.

On the Chicago front, we're quietly venue shopping. Any takers? We've found some amazingly strong cast members with some wonderfully lame material for our midwest debut. Very excited to finally share their stuff.

Newsweek gets Mortified

A while back, we got a call from the nice people at Newsweek saying they wantred to do a piece on Mortified. We replied with something totally mature like "Um, really? Awesome!" The cool thing is that the germ for the story came from one of our die hard fans in LA telling a friend who told friend etc. who happened to be a reporter.

Flash forward: Newsweek just ran the story. We've posted a copy to our website's media section if you want to see. However, if you own a print copy, we can be identified as the story that is not about dead people, starving people or exploding buildings.

And as a clarification, the story also refers to a few other similar-minded shows in a manner that made them sound like they are produced by Mortified. Since a few people have asked, nope, we're not connected. We are the largest and longest running show of its kind. Hope that helps.

Anyway, the fact that this story came about as a direct result of our fans (and not our team's hustling) shows us just how awesome grassroots projects can truly be.

We are forever grateful to our amazing supporters and this is a great example. We hope to continue 'sharing the shame'. You guys rock.

Dear San Fran Fans...

There's just no other way to say it. So here goes...

Mortified SF needs dudes. Straight dudes. Gay dudes. Asexual Morrissey-type dudes. It really doesn't matter. We just need dudes.

While Mortified SF 's always-sold-out events are packed with both genders in the audience, we're a bit perplexed that (of all ALL cities) our SF show curiously lacks males on stage.

So this is our mighty cry to America's other city of brotherly love. Calling all dudes. Mortified needs more male performers in San Francisco.

If you have a penis and want to make lots of people laugh by reading aloud your actual childhood writings (journals, letters, lyrics, poety, schoolwork, etc) at a stage show that's been praised by the likes by The Onion, This American Life, Jane, SF Bay Examiner, LA Times, SF Weekly, Metro New York, Boston Globe, etc... this is your chance to take part in an utterly unique comedy experience.

Wanna learn about Mortified's unique casting process? Great. We'd love to hear your very worst!

Just visit: http://www.getmortified.com/audition.

Tell your friends. Share the shame.

Oh. And yes. We are still looking for any gender in any city. This is just a more specific APB. In short, if you got boobs or live elsewhere, we'd love to hear your stuff.

-Producers

Thangst

So after almost four years of non-stop sold-out shows, our LA show (the original Mortified) is taking a long overdue summer vacation in the hopes of resting up and moreover, gathering NEW material. Hint hint: click audition suckas.

It's been a beyond amazing few years (in LA alone) and we're excited to continue growing our strange little-engine-that-could project. As such, we have a lot of cool projects in the works and can't wait to get to share them with you. Mortified is truly a labor of love for all involved and we (from producers to performers) work very hard to keep it fresh, funny, and fascinating. We hope it hits you that way.

I am constantly blown away by the amazing support our fans have shown us. Hell, the fact that we even 'have' an active following is quite surreal-- especially considering there's not much of a proven track record for this type of entertainment.

So on behalf of all-things-Mortified, I just want to say how appreciative I am. You guys rock. If I could, I'd totally dry hump each and everyone of you.

Thangst.

Dave
Sr. Mortified

PS: To our friends in LA, we'll see you in Fall. To everyone elsewhere, see you much sooner.

Mortified + Found Magazine + Material Girls

This June in LA, it's "MORTIFIED's School's Out Blow Out" event at King King! No more teachers. No more books. Plenty of angst.

After several years of non-stop sold-out shows in LA, Mortified has finally decided to take a much-needed summer vacation (er, at least just in LA; we're still sleepless elsewhere).

To celebrate Mortified's very LAST SHOW in LA until Fall, we've invited two of our very favorite BFFs to join us on stage! Attend either of these two very special events -- one night with a play, one night with a book/zine! In addition, this not-to-miss Mortified event will feature a lineup of some of our most requested performances (plus some people from our NYC show)! NOTE: our June events are @ a new venue for us (KING KING).

ORDER YOUR TICKETS NOW:
http://www.smarttix.com/show.aspx?showCode=MOR11

NIGHT ONE: “A NIGHT OF TEEN ANGST"
When: Wed. June 14, 8pm
Featuring:
* Material Girls (info: a comedic coming-of-age play set in the 1980s)
* Mortified LA (everyday people reading their actual teenage journals)

NIGHT TWO: “A NIGHT OF ACCIDENTAL ART”
When: Thurs. June 15, 8pm
Featuring:
* Found Magazine (info: a show and tell of anonymous "found" relics)
* Mortified LA (everyday people reading their actual teenage journals)

See you at the show. In angst we trust.

This Mortified Life

Angst invades America's airwaves. The always inspiring This American Life will be airing a never before broadcast Mortified clip that was recorded live at our LA show December 2005 at M Bar.

It features the sad/funny/strange/true letters of a then-teeange Will Seymour (www.williamseymour.com) and his then-ailing grandmother. It's one of our more poignant pieces-- the kind of stuff we love to get to do with Mortified. A lot of work went into shaping this piece and we hope you like it.

On a side note, Will is featured in our upcoming book (pre-order yours today) with a totally different but equally amazing submission.

hello

hello.

i am a journal.

one day you'll make fun of me.