Something super fun is brewing…yoga teachers/actors Jessie Barr and Tom O’Brien have created a web series called Om City detailing the life of a New York yoga teacher as she struggles to help people find their Zen. As a yoga teacher – and a former actor and New Yorker – this project hits close to home and I was inspired to share it out. It’s also hilarious, from the heart, and hits some deep truths about the yoga biz that hurt so good. Tom and I caught up for a quick chat.
How did this start?
Jessie and I met when we were both teaching at Elena Brower’s yoga studio in New York, Virayoga. And at the time, we were engaged (now married) and we are both actor/filmmakers as well as yoga teachers and I had made two feature films ( Fairhaven, Manhattan Romance) and we wanted to make something together and were inspired by the series High Maintenance. They self financed two seasons and then got picked up by HBO.
We were circling around different ideas for a series and were staying away from the yoga world just because we had both always kept these two parts of our lives separate and then we finally decide to go with the age old adage, write what you know. We just thought the storytelling possibilities were endless and we had never seen yoga depicted in the mainstream media in any kind of real way. It’s always broad and over the top and ridiculous. And in OM City we certainly have humor and fun with the yoga world but it’s always based in reality and comes from a place of love. Yoga has definitely changed both of our lives and we met each other through yoga!
How has the response been?
The response to season 1 has been overwhelming, it’s been viewed in 99 countries, we were a critics pick in the New York Times, featured in USA Today’s “Web To Watch” and voted “Best Web Series” by Decider.com and at the 2018 New Media Film Festival in LA. We got messages and comments from all across the globe. The series just seemed to resonate with yogis and non yogis as well. It’s been a really gratifying response and people have been reaching out and saying they want more episodes so that’s why we just launched the season 2 Kickstarter.
We literally released the first season, got married a month later and then moved across the country to LA. So, it’s been a while but we are finally ready and really excited to pick up this story and these characters and make more episodes of OM CITY.
Where can people find you?
All seven episodes of season 1 can be viewed for free on our website:
omcityseries.com And if you like it and want to see more episodes please click the Kickstarter link below and make a pledge and share on social media. It’s gonna take a village so we need everybody’s help to make OM CITY Season 2 a reality.
Go check it out!
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