BOSS OF ME - A WEB SERIES by SABI

BOSS OF ME - A WEB SERIES by SABI

Boss of Me tells the story of a new Creative Director that is sent down from “corporate” to manage the newly acquired independent production company Sabi Pictures. What ensues is a systematic restructuring (“Side-Shifting” as the star calls it) by Bret Donovan to the dislike of the employees. But Bret is an idea-man, and he alone believes his ideas are the one thing that can keep morale up and save the company. We’ll see. It stars Bret Donovan as the new Creative Director.

Click here for the :60 BOSS OF ME TV Spot

CREATING THE SERIES: Co-Creating the Boss of Me web series with John T. Woods was a convergence of several factors. First and foremost, we (at Sabi Pictures) were looking for a fun way to connect with fans, and specifically our films and our company and who we are -- with those that watch and enjoy our content. Reach out to fans and learn who they are at the same time as hopefully entertaining them. Thus, the series extends out into Facebook, where the star (Bret Donovan) has a very active Facebook profile. Boss of Me was an attempt at giving something back to our audience with a healthy amount of humor and poking fun at ourselves (and the film business in general). Our hope is to stimulating discussion & interaction. The idea of our having crafted ‘branded content’ was just a bonus not the intention. We certainly do want more attention on the work of Sabi, but practically speaking, we just wanted to create something and not spend a lot making it so that we could offer it for free without having to justify a return.


THE PROCESS: We shot everything on a Canon 7D, and used the prototype for a Cobb-Boom Helmet (which is an audio booming aid that you wear on your head invented by Jamie Cobb) to record sound. We used Pluraleyes to sync sound & Final Cut Pro to do the rest. Of course, these minimal resources isn’t ideal but it well suited our needs for keeping this small and on its feet. Often the shooter was wearing the Cobb-Boom Helmet to get the sound while also getting the picture -- which aside from getting the job done, was a funny sight to see. Much of the dialogue is improvised, and was guided by myself and John T. Woods through several phone calls, text messages with jokes, emails and a rough outline before going in. But it’s all really Bret Donovan. Bret was a find for us like no other, and of course there would be no show without him. His sincerity on and off camera is what keeps me as a co-creator interested in exploring new ideas and avenues while the camera is already rolling. The real investment with this series was our time and energy -- so it was important to keep it a fun (and very fast) working atmosphere. We hope this translated into the series.

Boss of Me is certainly not for everyone -- and it’s not something we were intending on getting on something like HBO for wide release -- but at the very most we hope that fans subscribe & interact and want to see more (and at the very least -- we hope they find it funny. In parts, anyway.) We look forward to your feedback!

Click here for the PILOT & entire BOSS OF ME series:

Kevin K. Shah -- @drmental on Twitter
John T. Woods -- @johntwoods on Twitter