FutureFive New Zealand - Consumer technology news & reviews from the future
Story image
Sat, 1st Oct 2011
FYI, this story is more than a year old

If you spend any time online, particularly on YouTube, you've definitely heard of this month's featured blogger, Jenna Marbles (real name, Jenna Mourey). This hilarious and refreshingly honest 24-year-old from Rochester, New York (though she says she relates more to her Canadian neighbours than to her fellow Americans) completed her undergraduate and Master's degrees in psychology at Suffolk University before realising that her real passion was in blogging and entertaining. Although she still works a regular day job at Bar Stool Sports, since starting her video blog in 2010, Jenna has acquired millions of followers online and is the latest YouTuber to be skyrocketed to fame, seemingly overnight. "It's completely ridiculous!” she said in an interview. "I had no idea anything like this would happen at all. It wasn't my intention, but it's great. It's exciting for me and I cannot wrap my brain around it. It's just crazy.

Jenna's videos are a series of hilarious, foul-mouthed and candid skits and rants about her daily life experiences, with everything from "how to trick people into thinking you're good looking” to "how to avoid talking to people you don't want to talk to” to "what boys do on the internet”. The best thing about Jenna's videos is that you get the feeling she doesn't even realise how funny she is – a truly natural comedian! "[All of my videos] are improvised. I'm not good at writing things down, I don't think”, she says.

The name for her blog "Jenna Marbles” was inspired by her dog, Mr. Marbles, who makes regular appearances in her videos, alongside her other dog, Kermit. One of her most popular videos, "what dogs do when you're not home”, is a skit acted out using the two dogs and voiced by Jenna and is both adorable and entertaining. "I like to hang out with my dogs. I pretty much do everything with Mr. Marbles,” she says.

When asked about her plans for the future, Jenna laughs saying "I have no plan! I'm going to keep making videos...I'm just going about my daily life the way that I would. I'm going to stay at my job, which is really great, and just keep making videos and see if anything happens.” Well, we have a feeling big things will be happening, Jenna!