Movies, Money & Mocktail

Trust Fun is brought to you by Mocktail

I need your money to make the next big comedy movie. Well wait a sec, let’s rewind…

About 15 years ago, I met my friend Vincent Mocco smoking weed in someone’s driveway after a Grouplove concert. A bond that can never be broken.

We were 15. I was high. And I remember thinking Vince was maybe the funniest person I had ever met. I’d love to rewrite history here and say that, even then, I looked him in the eyes and thought, One day, you and I are going to make movies together.

I did not think that. I was probably thinking about whether anyone had Cool Ranch Doritos.

But I do like to believe there was some tiny part of my melted teenage brain that knew I was going to do something with this guy one day.

Fast forward about seven years. We had both graduated college and were living in New York City. I was working at birddogs, still very much figuring out what the hell I was doing with my life, and Vince was at NYU film school making student films.

I had acted in college but hadn’t really done anything since moving to NYC. I knew two things: Vince was funny, and being in one of his videos sounded fun.

So I Facebook messaged him.

We made a video for one of his classes. You can watch it here. I’m not going to provide additional context because I think experiencing it cold is probably best for everyone.

From there, Vince and I kept finding excuses to work together. I eventually hired him as an intern at birddogs for a summer, where we became closer and spent a lot of time riffing about comedy, making stuff, and this vague idea that one day we should put together some sort of comedy group.

For years, it was mostly that. An idea.

Then three years ago we finally stopped talking about it and actually did something.

We started hosting weekly improv rehearsals in New York. There was no company. No audience. No theater. No business plan. We put up our own money, rented a room and basically invited anyone funny we knew to come hang out and do improv with us.

At first, that was it.

Just a bunch of people in a room trying to make each other laugh.

But then the same people kept coming back. The room started filling up. People got better. Chemistry formed. Characters developed. Friendships happened. Eventually we looked around and thought, wait a second... maybe we could actually put on a show?

So we rented a tiny-ass theater in the East Village with about 50 seats.

We sold it out.

Naturally, our response was to immediately rent a theater almost three times the size despite having absolutely no evidence that 80 additional people wanted to see us perform.

We sold that one out too.

Then we did it again. And again. And again.

Three years later, Steam Room Etiquette has sold out that 130-person theater 13 times. Nuts.

SRE is now a real, living, breathing thing. We have an insanely talented group of people. We have an audience that keeps showing up. People bring their friends. People come back. We were even invited to apply to the New York Comedy Festival this year.

We didn’t get in. But hey. That’s showbiz, baby.

And now, we’re onto the next thing.

Vince is first and foremost a filmmaker. He’s made beautiful short films, won awards, worked with Spike Lee and spent basically his entire adult life learning how to make movies.

Now he’s making his first feature.

It’s called Mocktail. We’re shooting in Jersey City, NJ this fall.

The best part is that the same group of random idiots who started doing improv together in a rented room three years ago are helping make the damn thing.

Actors from the group are in it. Friends are working on it. People from our comedy world are helping produce it, build it and bring it to life.

And Vince, for reasons that remain unclear to me, asked me to produce it.

I have never produced a feature film. I do not know how to produce a feature film.

So naturally, I am now producing a movie.

Mocktail is our attempt to make the kind of comedy movie we grew up loving. A true late-night, early-2000s-style comedy. The type of movie you’d stay up too late watching on Comedy Central with your friends. Dumb, fun, slightly inappropriate, quotable movies like Superbad, American Pie and all the other comedies that probably shaped our personalities more than our parents would like to admit.

They don’t really make a ton of those anymore. So we’re going to do it.

And I know this will sound painfully cheesy, but there is something genuinely cool about looking around at this group and realizing how we got here.

It started with two 15-year-olds getting high after a concert.

Then a Facebook message.

Then a NYU homework assignment.

Then an internship.

Then an idea we talked about for years.

Then a rented rehearsal room.

Then 50 people in a theater.

Then 130.

Then 130 again.

And again.

And again.

And now we're making a movie. A real movie.

I have no idea how this ends. Maybe that’s my favorite part.

We’ve spent the last three years building something without really knowing what it was supposed to become. We just kept doing the next thing that sounded fun. And every once in a while, the next thing becomes something much bigger than you expected.

Which brings me to the shameless portion of today’s newsletter.

Movies cost money. Like... a lot more money than renting an improv theater.

We’re currently raising money from investors to help us make Mocktail. If you’ve been reading Trust Fun for a while, you’ve basically had a front-row seat to me trying random shit, making things with my friends and seeing what happens.

This is unquestionably one of the coolest things I’ve ever gotten to be a part of.

So if the idea of helping an independent group of comedians and filmmakers make a feature comedy sounds interesting to you, I’d love to talk. I’m dead serious by the way.

Investing in a movie is obviously a real investment with real risk, and there are a lot more details to understand than I can cram into this email. But if you’re genuinely interested in learning more about Mocktail, the team, the film, or what participating as an investor looks like, email me:

[email protected]

I can send over everything. You and I both know it’s time to diversify.

Maybe in 15 years I’ll write another Trust Fun about how some random person reading this email decided to join us and it changed everything. Or maybe I’ll just have a really expensive DVD to give them.

Either way, that’s showbiz, baby.

See you next week.