Let’s be honest; if I slapped on a blonde wig and some glasses and filmed myself yammering on about shoes, the only person interested would be my mother. And I’d probably lose her by the one-minute mark. But that is because I am not the awesome, talented, and hilarious Liam Kyle Sullivan, the actor/comedian whose performance as Kelly, the cranky teen star of the viral music video Shoes, sent him on a crazy fame trajectory still soaring upward two years after the vid’s debut.
Sullivan had been creating comedic videos for his site A Liam Show for two years when a fan uploaded Shoes to YouTube in 2006. In it, Kelly, incensed by a hideous birthday gift from her parents, storms out of the house to get what she really wants — shoes! The resulting psychedelic swirl of shopping, anger management issues, and fire dancers, all laid over an unrelenting dance beat, scored more than 21 million views on YouTube and catapulted Sullivan and Kelly into media stardom. (Shoes won the 2007 People’s Choice Award for Best User Generated Video, and Liam-as-Kelly released an album on iTunes, for crying out loud.)
Kelly’s since appeared in other smash music videos like Text Message Breakup and Let Me Borrow That Top, but Sullivan’s no one-trick pony. He often plays other members of the family, too, including Kelly’s grumpy father, simple brother, and, um, earthy Aunt Susan, and he directs the misguided superhero saga Purple Man, starring Scott Pitts. (Don’t miss the end credits for The Trunk.)
Still, Kelly remains his most successful creation. She’s a web entity in her own right, appearing in videos for Weezer and The Dresden Dolls and lending her weblebrity to Take180 to help explain their groovy methods of incorporating viewer contributions into series content. But even without Kelly’s trademark “Betch” and “Deck” shirts, Sullivan is enjoying the fruits of fame. He was a series regular on the VH1 series I Hate My 30’s, and spent this fall touring with Margaret Cho as her opening act.
So remember: Don’t be thinking you can just throw on some striped stockings and a bitchy attitude and ride a gravy train to success and BFF status with Margaret Cho. As far as we can tell, there’s only one person who can fill Kelly’s shoes, and his name is Liam Kyle Sullivan.
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