LIFE

Friends

Grace, Mamrie and Hannah talk fierce friendship and filmmaking

YouTube is great for a lot of things: Cat videos, makeup tutorials and non-stop LOLs. But if there's one truly amazing thing YouTube has given to the world, it's Grace Helbig, Mamrie Hart and Hannah Hart. OK, that's three, not one...but you get the point. The hilar and talented YouTubers are essentially the internet's most-famous besties and their well-known friendship has earned them the title of YouTube's "Holy Trinity," which is definitely not a title we can argue with. They've been making amazing YouTube vids together for years (on each of their respective channels), they created a one-of-a-kind touring improv-comedy show and even starred in the 2014 film Camp Takota together, written by Mamrie. 

Now, these fab friends have teamed up yet again for their new flick Dirty 30. The comedy follows Kate (Mamrie) and her two longtime besties—Evie (Grace) and Charlie (Hannah)—as Kate approaches a huge milestone: Her 30th birthday. But Kate isn't very "OMG" about the whole HBD ordeal. She's pretty down in the dumps about how her life is turning out, so (like any good friend) Evie insists on throwing her a *huge* bash to celebrate. However, things turn out way more cray-cray than chill.

We sat down with the trio to talk friendship, filmmaking and YouTube. Check out what the BFFs had to say about it all—and just try not to be inspired by these über talented girls.

Girls' Life: We *love* that the films you three create focus so heavily on friendship. Why is it important for you guys to tell stories like this?
Mamrie: The older I get, the more important my female friendships get, so we just want to make sure we show that is an important part of your life and not just your romantic relationships.
Hannah: Platonic love is one of the most lasting forms of love, right? Those are the people that stay with you for a lifetime.
Grace: It's a fun story for us to tell because it's real. 

GL: You guys have a ton of YouTube pals in the movie, too, like Flula Borg, Mikey Murphy, Rhett and Link and Chester See. Was it important for you to bring them into the mix?
Hannah: I think one of the benefits of going from being a digital content creator to doing something like full-length feature films is that you get to create jobs and get to cast your friends—but only if they’re appropriate for the role. I know Mamrie, when she was writing, she wasn’t writing specifically with people in mind but we’re fortunate enough to have a lot of talented friends that we've met in the space, so it was just kind of a natural incorporation. 

GL: Mamrie, because you wrote this movie, Kate, Evie and Charlie are literally written just for you guys, which is so cool! Do you like to incorporate bits and pieces of your own personalities into the characters you portray?
Mamrie: I think so. There's definitely little parts of us that are in each character, but we also want to make sure that we are acting and people aren’t watching it as ourselves.

GL: How did filming Dirty 30 compare to working on your first flick, Camp Takota.
Mamrie: It was very similar in a sense because we feel like there's always a really good vibe on set. But it was different in a sense. It was a cast of characters. So rather than us having to be completely on, we got to sit back and watch our friends and colleagues perform and really get to enjoy it.
Grace: It was also just a funny, comedy movie and Camp Takota had funny moments but it was also very sweet and it had some more serious scenes in it, so it was really fun to just kind of goof off and enjoy the comedy aspect of what we love to do. 

GL: What is it about you three as friends that makes it so easy to work together?
Hannah: I think it's because we all bring something different, we all make each other laugh, we all want to create great work but we all come at work from a different approach.
Grace: As much as we're different, we have similar philosophies in "work hard, play hard" in a way. Being really, really ambitious and really hard working but then finding the balance between being able to have fun with each other. Thankfully we get to have fun in the work that we do anyway, which is awesome.
Mamrie: I think we all have our unique strength, like Hannah said, and know when to let the other person take the lead because it's in your best interest. We have an extreme level of trust with one another and know that whether you’re having the best day or the worst day—or the worst cramps of your life—you know that the other person is going to have your back and take care of you. 

GL: How does it feel to be able to create something so special with the people you love? 
Grace: It’s insanely spoiling. It was such a wonderful experience getting to work with each other on something that wasn’t a YouTube video, that we were like, "How do we continue to do this over and over again?"
Mamrie: If you go on a roller coaster for the first time, it's thrilling and you think maybe it won’t be the second time because you know the drops and you know the turns, but luckily we were able to recreate it again and it was just as much fun and now I know that the next one will be as well. 

GL: Oooh, the next one?! Do you guys have plans to keep creating movies together?
Mamrie: I would love to. I think this movie speaks for itself and it's really funny and I have no doubt that everyone will very much enjoy it. We're willing to supply as long as people have the demand.
Hannah: Yeah, exactly. It's so much fun to work with Grace and Mamrie. This has been a dream. I hope that we get to do it again. I know that we're all busy people but it's so much fun.

Dirty 30 hits select theaters and Digital HD on Sept. 23 and Target (exclusively!) on Sept. 27. You can preorder it here on iTunes.

Photo credit: Dirty 30, Mamrie Hart

by Sydney Adamson | 9/20/2016
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