BROWNMARK FILMS – The Samwell Project – “What What (In the Butt)”
Special Entertainment created Brownmark Films and made the music video for an unpublished song by Samwell called “What What (In the Butt)”. The video immediately went viral and has since become a worldwide sensation with over 45 million downloads so far on YouTube alone. Follow-up videos featuring Samwell have been downloaded millions of times as well.
The video rocketed up the charts the day after it was released when Perez Hilton featured it on his popular blog PerezHilton.com. The next day, VH1′s Best Week Ever featured the video, which also contributed to its viral success.
A year later, after the video had already been downloaded nearly nine million times, an episode of South Park aired that revolved around the What What phenomenon and featured a shot-for-shot re-creation of the video, starring Butters (a popular South Park character) in place of Samwell. The South Park episode introduced the What What video to an even broader audience and further solidified it as a pop culture artifact.
Samwell and Johnny Depp
During the filming of Michael Mann’s Public Enemies, Academy Award winner (and Samwell fan) Marion Cotillard invited Samwell to the set to surprise her co-star Johnny Depp (who is also a Samwell fan).
In 2008, Samwell was a guest on the BBC television show Lily Allen and Friends, where his interview with Lily Allen was followed by a live performance of “What What (In the Butt)”, complete with choreographed male dancers. The “What What” song then surfaced on an episode of Sweden’s Got Talent in which four naked young men danced to the song while holding pancakes over their private parts. Members of the Israeli Army made a controversial fan remake of the video which became popular after being featured on Boing Boing.
What What (in the Butt) has been the #17 Top Rated YouTube Video of All Time and was listed on YouTube’s “Most Discussed Videos Of All Time” and “Most Watched Music Videos Of All Time” charts for over two years. The video has screened at the MIX Brasil Film Festival, the Milwaukee International Film Festival, and at numerous art galleries. To date, it’s received over 170,000 viewer comments, has been written about in over 1,500 blogs and news articles, and has been honored with over 1,000 response videos. In January the video won a Pill award for Best Animation at the 2010 Pill Awards show in New York.
The video has been mentioned in The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, CBS News, CNN, The Hollywood Reporter, TV Guide, The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, The LA Times, E! Online, MTV, VH1, The Onion, NME, Gawker, BuzzFeed, Billboard, and many others. It’s also been listed on Google Trends Daily Hot List, was featured on KnowYourMeme.com, placed #69 on urlesque’s 100 Most Iconic Internet Videos of All Time list, and is listed in CollegeHumor’s Web Celeb Hall of Fame.
Samwell has his own line of merchandise (including T-Shirts, underwear, running shorts, and more); a new live phone call service called Special Greetings from Samwell; a music video promoting Safer Sex called Protect Respect is available on YouTube; an iPhone App called Shaky Advice from Samwell is now available on iTunes; and a feature film called What What (In the Butt): The Movie is currently in development.
Last year Samwell appeared on Tosh.0, a hit Comedy Central series about viral videos. The episode featured an extensive dialog between Daniel Tosh and Samwell in a sauna, followed by an unplugged duet version of the “What What” song by Samwell and Josh Homme, lead singer of Queens of the Stone Age and Them Crooked Vultures. Daniel Tosh said that Samwell was one of the best guests he’s had on the show and invited Samwell back for another episode where he was nominated for the Season Two MVP Award.
Check out the new OFFICIAL SAMWELL website!
Mar-16 NEW iPhone App: Shaky Advice from Samwell
Apr-23 ‘What What’ on Sweden’s Got Talent
Feb-24 New Video! “Samwell Goes To Johnny Depp”
Feb-17 Defamer writes about “What What: The Movie”
Follow Samwell on Twitter at OfficialSamwell
“A viral video sensation.”
- – Entertainment Weekly
“A viral phenomenon.”
- – The Hollywood Reporter
“A classic Internet song.”
- – Funny or Die
“Here is today’s truly most viral video, because real humans, not charts decide what is viral … This whole thing, funny as it may be, seems like a perfectly executed viral conspiracy. Shrouded in mystery, baked on MySpace, and referred to as a WORLD PREMIERE, it has nearly 100,000 views on YouTube and the buzz about it far trumps that. We assure you this will be all over the place.”
- – VH1′s Web Junk
“YouTube hero Samwell’s epic anthem What What (In the Butt) has propelled the Chicago unknown to Internet fame.”
- – Singer Lily Allen
“This is the stuff that gives my life purpose.”
- – Fresh, Crunk+Disorderly
“19,864,151 Samwell fans simply cannot get enough of his smash hit What What (In the Butt).”
- – Gawker.com
“Internet sensations are a dime a dozen these days, but rarely does one get tens of millions of hits for a single entry.”
- — Mark Bieganski, Time Out Chicago
“One of Web 2.0′s early Internet superstars.”
- – OC Weekly
“A famous ode to anal sex.”
- – Jezebel.com
“Van Gogh died penniless and alone while Samwell’s video for “What What (In The Butt)” has 33 million views on YouTube.”
- – Zack Rosen, The New Gay
“An international Web sensation.”
- – Bruce Vielmetti, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
“Skip the remix, this one’s perfect for my rave.”
- – DJ Douggpound, writer/editor, Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!
“For some reason I kept picturing Tim Hardaway playing one-on-one with this guy, and Hardaway lost by forfeit.”
- – Eric Fensler, writer, Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!
“The video of Butter’s dancing to What What In the Butt is TiVo rewind worthy, and will get stuck in your head immediately. Long after the episode ages poorly, I’ll still be humming, “What what, in the butt!’”
- – BlogCritics Magazine
“Long live freedom of expression.”
- – Adam Curry, Original MTV VJ, Daily Source Code
“Song of the day: ‘What What (In the Butt)’ by Samwell.”
- – NME
“This week features Andrew Swant and Bobby Ciraldo, who made the music video for Samwell’s What What (In The Butt), which became a YouTube smash.”
- – DJ Hostettler, The Onion A.V. Club
“The YouTube star’s recently launched merchandise store is chock-full of items directly referencing that ode to behinds.”
- – Idolator.com
“In the recent ‘Canada on Strike’ episode of South Park the boys parodied the earworm viral video What What (In the Butt).”
- – Comedy Central Insider
“If you haven’t seen the video for ‘What What (In the Butt),’ you need to.”
- – Jason Harper, Pitch Music Weekly
“What was the most played song on our iPod in the past week? Samwell’s ‘What What (In the Butt).’”
- – Scissor Sisters interviewed by Gothamist
“Frat masculine archetypes and tranny lipgloss sensations alike bonded over the sinful pleasure of the simple beat and the even simpler lyrics.”
- – Courtney Nichols, Fruit Fly Life
“Topping the list so far is the horrendous rap – and YouTube sensation – What What (In the Butt) by American singer Samwell.”
- – Joanna Hunkin, New Zealand Herald
“Milwaukee’s best example of overnight Internet success may be Swant and Ciraldo, whom you might know from their video for Samwell’s ‘What What In the Butt.’ For months they remained the anonymous creators of a million-hit world-famous video, overhearing random conversations about it while hiding behind the proverbial curtain.”
- – Jeff Kenney, Vital Source Magazine
“What What (In the Butt) was, by far, 2007’s video meme of the year … Samwell’s quest for world domination continues unabated, thanks to the help of What What‘s directors, Andrew Swant and Bobby Ciraldo.”
- – DJ Hostettler, Third Coast Digest
“Special Entertainment’s Andrew Swant and Bobby Ciraldo are responsible for the hilarious visual journal through Samwell’s hit and were pretty damn excited when last night’s episode of South Park spoofed the video.”
- – Julie Lawrence, OnMilwaukee.com
“It seems like a joke, but I kinda think this is a totally serious statement of pride and Pat Robertson’s worst nightmare. Either way, the unsigned singer Samwell and the folks at Milwaukee production company Brownmark Films have succeeded in creating a video that joins ‘It’s Raining Men,’ ‘YMCA’ and ‘Lick It Up’ in the pantheon of very gay videos.”
- – VideoStatic.com
“In addition to its YouTube success, the video was embraced by the blogosphere and many mainstream media outlets as well. The runaway internet success of What What (In The Butt) put them squarely in the crosshairs of the Internet exploitation that South Park parodied.”
- – Good Is The New Bad
“In case you didn’t have the Internet in 2007 and missed it, What What (In the Butt) was a YouTube sensation in which Samwell extolls the virtues of sodomy.”
- — Julian Hattem, Prefix
“What What (In the Butt)” is a risque single by Samwell. This video is one of the Internet phenomenons parodied in the South Park episode ‘Canada on Strike’.”
- — CollegeHumor.com
“What What (In the Butt) went viral for its weird staging and camp references to homosexuality.”
- — Rae Votta, urlesque
“The What What (In the Butt) guy had quite a following on YouTube.”
- – Carol Hilker, Examiner.com
“What What (In The Butt) remains one of the biggest viral hits on YouTube.”
- — JoeMyGod.com
“I wonder if Samwell has become the next gay icon after Kylie Minogue?”
- – Top 10 YouTube Pop Culture Videos
MEDIA MENTIONS:
“People started sending it to their friends and next thing you know you have a worldwide sensation … It’s the best three minutes you’ll spend all week — I mean, it’s magic.”
- – Kevin & Bean, L.A.’s #1 Morning Show, KROQ
“What What (In the Butt) is a masterpiece, right up there with Thriller.”
- – Daniel Tosh, Comedy Central’s Tosh.0
“We love it! It’s equal parts brazilliant and shiteous, yet we couldn’t stop from smiling. Yes, WHAT WHAT in the BUTT! Check it out!”
- – Perez Hilton, PerezHilton.com
“A short music video posted online by a fellow calling himself Samwell has circulated around the world via the Internet. Samwell tells us he is gay, but he’s not tapping into a gay audience.”
- – Brian Alexander, MSNBC
“One of the Top 10 Memes of the last decade.”
- – Collective Review
“What What (In the Butt) made our list of the 100 most iconic Internet videos and it’s got a staggering 28 million views on YouTube.”
- – Jay Hathaway, urlesque
“With only one song to his credit Samwell has transcended cybercelebrity and achieved celebrity itself.”
- – Ines Munoz Martinez-Mora, El Pais
“‘What what in the butt?’ is not only a real question, but it needs an answer. And the answer is ‘Let’s do it in the butt, okay.’”
- – Josh Homme, lead singer for Queens of the Stone Age
“A viral phenomenon.”
- – Billboard
“This one is simply too amazing to slip through the cracks. I don’t know much about who or what this is, but it’s by someone called Samwell … you’ll be glad you stuck around.”
- – VH1′s Best Week Ever
“”An iconic anal anthem.”"
- – Xeni Jardin, BoingBoing
“Sheila ‘What, what, WHAT?!’ Broflovski needs to put out a cover of this song immediately.”
- – Dan Savage of Savage Love
“One of the Top 5 Booty Songs of all time.”
- – Jillian Jamruszka, College Times
“It’s hilariously campy, and when it hit the Internet last February, people forwarded it to everyone they knew.”
- – Lilledeshan Bose, MKE Magazine
“Not sure what makes this such compelling viewing, but the piece de resistance has gotta be either the extended smile, or the “What” on each ass cheek.”
- – Stereogum Magazine
“The video quickly went viral on YouTube, gaining millions of viewers and even the attention of actor Johnny Depp.”
- –Marc Felion, Feast of Fun
“One of the Top Ten Internet Memes of all time.”
- – Squidoo
“One of the Top 13 Most Hilarious Internet Music Sensations.”
- – The Baker’s Dozen, LP33.TV
“Calling it a classic is no joke: Samwell’s ode to the joys of booty has racked up 33 million YouTube views since its 2007 debut.”
- – Jay Hathaway, urlesque
“What What (In The Butt) seemed a mild satire on the Matt Damon/Ben Affleck videos from Jimmy Kimmel Live!”
- – TV Squad
“I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard in a long time, and What What In the Butt has been stuck in my head for the past week!”
- – The Daily Illini
“Samwell conquered the world with the video What What (In the Butt) and followed it up with a series of saterical art videos.”
- — Pride Radio Denmark
“There’s Slash, Bono, Prince, Sting, and then… there’s Samwell.”
- — Melysa Martinez, JackFM
“Internet sensation Samwell made us roll on the floor laughing with What What (In the Butt).”
- — Valentina España, Terra
“It’s one of the most ridiculous things I’ve seen.”
- – Shaun Morgan of Seether
“Samwell: Noted for being an openly gay R&B artist and Internet sensation. Hit Single: What What (In the Butt), a campy homage to all things, ummm, anal.”
- – Brittanie Shey, Houston Press
“Gay as hell, but that’s not the point.”
- – Howard Insider, The Daily Dose
“A peppy anal-sex romp.”
- – Shepherd Express
“Chances are you’re one of the 28 million people who has viewed Samwell’s strange What What in the Butt video on YouTube … This web meme has reached the apex of weird.”
- — Ray Padgett, Consequence of Sound
“If you don’t know the name Samwell the chances are still in favor that you know his popular viral video called What What (In The Butt).”
- — Beats and Bombs
“What What In the Butt — Butters’ new song becomes an internet sensation.”
- – The Daily Show.com
“Someone will do a flash video of “What What in the Butt” using that picture of McCain apparently trying to give Obama a rimjob at the last debate.”
- – OpEdNews
“We were definitely thinking we were moving up in the world, going from Iron and Wine to Samwell. We got to meet him and he was very nice.”
- – The 1900s, interviewed by OnMilwaukee.com
“You’ll be singing this hook all day.”
- – YepYep
“My daily tip is that you search for What What (In the Butt) to get a good laugh.”
- – DJ Mona, Sveriges Radio, Norway’s National Radio