I un-booked CHRIS ROCK... How to find a daily story for my YouTube vlog?

This is an attempt at "How to find a daily story for a YouTube vlog".

My search every day took me here, a story about one of my worst moments in my job.

I'm a development producer, and one day I got the internationally famous comedian and movie star Chris Rock booked for a show... except I didn't and then I had to un-book him.

Can I find a happy ending?

I un-booked CHRIS ROCK... How to find a daily story for my YouTube vlog?



TRANSCRIPT: (CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE)

THIS IS THE TRANSCRIPT - CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE!

Every morning I go for a walk and usually I just end up daydreaming...

...and the daydream I had this week was: "What if I could find a story?" 

One story and share it on YouTube, so this is how it worked out.

Hello I'm Neil by the way. 

I'm a development producer helping high achieving creators and performers just like you to get ideas out of your head and out onto here on YouTube, and this is my attempt this week to get some ideas out of my head.

On Saturday I saw this clip and it had a really big effect on me.

"A really uncontrollable angry pack of bananas."

"Snow White and the seven dwarfs."

"Sorry, no it was The Wild Bunch!

Plenty of time to catch up, it's a lovely contest so far, Dennis..."

Not that one.

It was this clip of Chris Rock on the Howard Stern show talking about how he was bullied at school, and then he bumped into one of his bullies.

He was working as a security guard on his movie set.

A guy who literally one day turned me upside down and shook the money out of my pockets and I'm filming a scene and I look and I'm like is that b? 

And he nodded, you know he was kind of ashamed, and I just gave him just a quick look like... "Hey man I hope you're doing well, you take care" and I kept it moving.

I didn't like get him off the set.

His sin had punished him, he could have been my friend.

The fact that he had to go through that whole day and watch me walk around and watch me. 

I was directing a movie and it'd be so close to me but yet so far.

Do you ever watch Bugs Bunny?

When did Elmer Fudd get really mad at Bugs Bunny?

Not when he shothim in the face with an anvil.

Do you know when Elmer Fudd got really mad?

When Bugs Bunny kissed him, that's when he would lose his mind.

And when somebody like does you wrong, just give 'em a kiss.

Just give him a kiss.

Shall I tell you my Chris Rock story? 

The... the story where I booked... I actually booked Chris Rock for a TV show that I was producing and then I de-booked him.

I unbooked him, I don't know what the right word is.

I uninvited him from the TV show.

It's a short story and it hasn't got a happy ending.

Or maybe it does, I don't know see what you think but anyway back in 2001 I was a producer.

I-- here's footage of me on a comedy interview series.

It was shot on location - outdoors mainly in the United States.

Really big high-profile names the... the show was tiny but we had this amazing guest booker.

This American guest booker in the States who's just getting us these ridiculous Hollywood names.


This is me and Jean-Claude Van Damme.

He was getting about ten... fifteen thousand dollars per guest that he booked, but man... 

I don't know what-- I DO know some of the things that he did to to get us these guests.

Uh so, he really put himself on the line and really came up with the goods.

Anyway I get a call from this amazing guest booker and he says "Neil, I think I've got Chris Rock. Do you want Chris Rock on your show?

And I yes, yes!

He said: Are you sure, because I need to know now because I need to I need to make the arrangements with the publicist.

I think it was for us to do something really cool like ride along with him in a limo to the Grammys or something but whatever it was it was a good chunk of time.

Enough to shoot this one hour comedy interview show with Chris Rock! 

So I said yes! 

Yes please! That's fantastic! Nice one! 

So he goes off and and makes the arrangements with Chris Rock's people and because he's in the United States and we're here in the UK I couldn't tell the channel - the TV channel that this programme was for - I couldn't tell them until the next morning.

So the next morning I send an email saying "we've got Chris Rock!" and I got a reply which was...

"Ah no. I don't think so. 

It's not for us."

So now there's a to-and-fro of emails and I think it went something along the lines of... 

"But it's Chris Rock!" 

And the reply was: "Yeah but he's not really... he's not really our audience."
We're to'ing and fro'ing and basically they don't want Chris Rock but I've...

But I've booked him! 

Shall I tell you which TV channel this is? 

I'll put it in the comments so that I can delete it because I'm a wuss and they can still hunt me down like a dog.

They would not budge.

They did not want Chris Rock as a guest on this programme.

To give you an idea of how big Chris Rock was back then even - you know this is footage of him interviewing Prince four years before we booked him.

He's funny and famous they just didn't want to know, so now I've got to go back to the guest booker and and tell him that they don't want him.

I'm shaking while I'm telling you this story.

Not because I'm angry. 

Maybe I should be, but because I'm embarrassed.

I was really embarrassed that this guy had really gone out on a limb and yet they didn't want him and I remember the tone of the voice of the guest booker.

He was bewildered and offered to send them tapes which... but I had to explain that they just did not want to budge.

"It's it's not for us.

"I don't think it's our audience." 

So then I had to unbook Chris Rock.

I had to - I think I blamed it on logistics and not being able to get a camera crew out for the date that they had suggested, but man that was horrible.

And it made me think: "Well maybe I'm doing this job wrong."

I felt bad that I couldn't persuade someone that this was a good idea.

This was a fantastic idea.

This would have been a fantastic booking for the show and I'm probably embarrassed because I'm sure I've done the same thing to other people over the years.

On the upside, this is why I love YouTube.

What I love about this - about you and me making things on YouTube is that we do not have to ask permission from anyone to have a go at making something that we think is good.

We can make stuff.

We can make whatever we like without having to ask permission from anybody and I absolutely love this.

So Chris Rock is absolutely right.

"And when somebody like does you wrong... just give 'em a kiss." 

I'm gonna leave you with some footage of some baby rats to cheer me up.

Look there they are.

Do you have a story?

Do you have a story from the last 24 hours?

Please put it in the comments, I'd love to hear it or even better make a video about it and post the link in the comments below.

If you've reached this point in the video why not give me a thumbs up?

That would be really helpful or even hit the subscribe button, and on screen now is what YouTube thinks you should be watching next!

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