How KevOnStage is building a better entertainment industry
"I think the best way to tell the story of how I got to where I am today is just one person at a and one film at a go," is comedian and creator Kevin Fredericks - better known by his online moniker KevOnStage. Kev talks in his studio and office located in Los Angeles, the epicenter of his most creative venture so far: KevOnStage Studios. But the digital creator didn't land Hollywood-level production digs in a matter of hours. Kev's business grew from a side hustle to full-time gig over nearly a decade of the digital grind.
"Before the path of a comedian was to move towards L.A., get on The Tonight Show, and try to convince an agent," he says. "Now thanks to the growth of the internet it is possible to reach your own fans and become a celebrity." Since 2011, KevOnStage has slowly but surely amassed over 1M+ Instagram followers and 800K+ YouTube followers, posting candid comedy clips to his loyal online followers and is affectionately referred to as the Stage Crew.
"I believe that charting your own path, in my opinion, is very crucial," adds Kev. "Right now, I'm making my own show which I produced and shot, and funded that no one in Hollywood needed to accept. I'm able create all of it and then present it directly to my audience."
The basics of HTML0
Kev has been developing his online community more than a decade ago. However, he says things took a while to take off. "I did not see any significant results as KevOnStage until probably 2017," states Kev. "Before that I had been working hard, not getting many views, like many people."
At that point Kev had to figure out his ultimate north star in the process of creating content that was authentic to his own sensibilities and beliefs. "When creators don't work out of their heart, the achievement is exhausting," states Kev. "I was always okay not blowing up every now and then and just being able to make content that I was passionate about. And I think due to that I've been more successful, as opposed to doing whatever was working."
When his comics career started to take off in earnest, Kev took to touring throughout the United States with other comics, but the pandemic brought those meetings in person to a halt. Keen to come up with new methods to keep the momentum going the brother of Kev came to Kev with an idea of his own that was a streaming service.
Giving back the power
Kev is the first person to admit an OTT service was not on his radar as the next step in his business. "We were first just trying to create our own independent films and then my brother told me, 'Yo, I've found a way we could create our own application in the future,'" he says. "I didn't think about that as possibility."
Kev reached out to his business partner and producer Brennon Edwards. He offered to collaborate on the idea of creating an OTT app. "It was an easy decision," says Brennon, currently the president of KevOnStage Studios, because it provided them with the ability to produce (and make money by selling) their content according to their own rules. "We live in an age in which the barriers to access to being able to be creative is significantly smaller. This has transformed our game."
"We have been able to move beyond what we had been expecting Hollywood to accomplish for us, and begin to do it by ourselves," he says. "We collaborate directly with our audience, which we've got. They're the ones that give us the money for us to accomplish the things we'd like to do. This gives us the power back, as creators."
Empowering fellow creators
Since the launch of KOSS Brennon, Kev and co-founder and Co-CEO Melissa Fredericks have consciously created a supportive and creative environment that allows others Black creators to explore their creative work. "I just I am grateful for this place and that there are people working there, that we allow people to follow their dreams at KOSS," says Kev.
What's so wonderful about this adventure is that we're going beyond what conventional Hollywood claims, and putting it to our own," Melissa says. Melissa. "We're creating a positive influence on the people around us. That is not waiting for Hollywood to accredit your name. This is the moment to decide, we made this decision by ourselves. Period. And we can do this ourselves. Period. And we can give people opportunities that they wouldn't otherwise have the chance to. Period."