Sundance Suicide internet story an elaborate hoax

A group of young filmmakers planted a fake internet news story about a filmmaker commiting suicide after being rejected by the Sundance Film Festival. Their goal for the story was to gain exposure for their indie movie "Shtick Men". The hoax began as an inside joke for their cast and crew and eventually got out of control.

The headline for the fake news story read "Sundance Suicide first ever". The story was about a filmmaker who committed suicide after his film "Shtick Men" was rejected this year from the Sundance Film festival. The story seemed real because it could be found on what appeared to be an MSN news archive server ( www.msnnewsarchive.com ).

But the story was a hoax that had begun as an inside joke for the filmmakers. Eric Jewell, one of the directors of "Shtick Men" had sent the parody news story to Jeff Hays (his co-director) as a way of telling him that their film was not going to Sundance. They then sent it to the cast and crew, who then sent it on to their friends. Eventually the story made the rounds on the internet. An internet movie magazine (Film Threat) did an article on it ( http://www.filmthreat.com/News.asp?Id=1118 ) and the story grew even more from there.

The story went on to say that the deceased filmmaker had left his suicide note online and it could be seen at the official website for the movie ( www.shtickmenmovie.com ). This drove traffic up more that a thousand-fold to the filmmakers' website.

The movie Shtick Men is a mockumentary about a struggling comedian who is trying to make it to the big time.