James Lafferty and Stephen Colletti want your help! The One Tree Hill costars are currently pitching out their pilot, Everyone Is Doing Great, and Us Weekly can exclusively announce they’ve also launched an Indiegogo campaign to raise funds and get the fans involved.
“It’s consistent with the way that we shot the pilot,” Lafferty, who cowrote the show and plays the lead of Jeremy, tells Us about the decision to crowdfund the project. “We didn’t have a whole lot of funding, we just had a group of people that were really passionate and really believed in the project. We got our pilot done and we did what we set out to do.”
He continued: “The natural progression in thinking about how to get the season made, was how can we do this ourselves and continue to preserve this process that we’ve come up with? Indiegogo was the best way to keep our creative process insulated and the best way to connect with the fans and people that have been so supportive with us through the years and get them involved in the conception of the whole thing.”
The show, which is also making the TV festival circuit this summer, centers around Jeremy and Seth (Colletti), two actors in Los Angeles who are struggling to find what’s next, five years after starring in a blockbuster vampire franchise. The dark comedy tracks the best friends as they work together to figure out their career paths as well as the ins and outs of life and love.
To be part of the Indiegogo campaign, fans can make donations starting as low as $15. As a result, the actors are offering incredible perks, from an appreciation package or a social media shoutout to a set visit or a post-production experience!
“The One Tree Hill fan base kept the show alive for as many seasons as it went because they were vocal online. We were the little engine that could. It inspired us in a way to go through both a traditional and a different way to make this,” Colletti, who got his start on Laguna Beach in 2004 and went on to costar alongside Lafferty on One Tree Hill in 2007, adds.
Everyone Is Doing Great is also executive produced by the Nelms Brothers, the same team behind Lafferty’s film Small Town Crime.
“The show is very funny, but also tackles real issues in a very meaningful way and that’s a testament to the great writing from James and Stephen,” Ian and Eshom Nelms tell Us. “This is our fourth project with James —the first three of which we were the directors and he was an actor who we just loved working with time and time again. He is so incredibly talented and now, to have the tables turned with him at the helm, we’re excited to collaborate with him in a different way.”
To find out more about the campaign, click here. Plus, watch the teaser for Everyone Is Doing Great above.
