Dorm Life is a mockumentary web series created by former students of UCLA. It follows the fictional lives of the inhabitants of the college dorm floor 5 South. It is produced by Attention Span Media, a Los Angeles based social media studio and is a 2008 Webby Honoree for Best Writing and Comedy: Individual Short or Episode. Dorm Life is also Hulu's most watched web show.
After a successful first season, Dorm Life returned for a second season with sponsor Carl's Jr.."Dorm Life back with Carl's Junior"
Overview
The fictional show is made in the form of a documentary that purports to record the lives of actual college freshmen. It takes place almost entirely within their dorm floor, 5 South. Each character has a webcam for the purpose of individual reflection or addresses to the audience. There are also separate webcam clips aside from those of the main episodes, as well as profiles maintained by each character on the website's "community lounge," with interactions between them and with fans on the website's forum.
Cast
Main cast Chris W. Smith as Michael "Mike" Sanders,"Chris Smith College OTR interview" the de facto main character of the series. He is very thoughtful and loves to laugh. He tries to get along with everyone, and is often the one planning fun activities for his floormates. Mike begins his freshman year still attached to his steady girlfriend, Emily, who is still in high school. The relationship is strained by the long distance, and they break up over Thanksgiving break, in the episode "Turkey Drop". Near the end of the first semester, Mike found out that Brittany had had a crush on him, but he ruined any chance of a relationship by sleeping with Courtney after a night of partying in "Group Shot". After that, he started to become isolated from the rest of the floor. Due to these feelings of isolation, he hooks up with Emily again over Christmas Break. Mike has some resentment that his friend and roommate, Josh, is distancing himself from the floor so he can be a documentarian, mainly following Mike's depression. Mike's friendships are healed in the episode "The Frat Party", when Gopher, Shane, and Danny B join Mike in a fight with a frat guy that is insulting Brittany. Brittany and Mike start their friendship again during the Spring Break episodes, but they decide to be only friends, and nothing more. In the episode "Dormal", Mike and Brittany finally kiss, to the relief of the rest of their floormates. However, after they kiss again, they agree that it is too awkward and forced, and that they were better as strictly friends. Mike loves improvised games and pranks, and also has several "random skills" such as juggling, moving his ears, and balancing objects on his nose and chin. Throughout the year, Mike hosts "The Mike Sanders Show" on his webcam, where he interviews various people of interest. Jack DeSena as Shane Reilly, party animal, Gopher's best friend, and the floor president of 5 South. He is a musical prodigy, and he is at college on full scholarship. His catchphrase is "Probly", he always wears a black T-shirt which reads "My Friend Sam is 50", and he is bisexual, shown in several episodes ("The Screening", "Moving Out [Part 2]"). He is almost constantly seen drinking alcohol, and rarely seen attending classes. After Shane misses all of his finals of the first semester, he has to meet with Dean Tomlinson, and is told that he will be placed on academic probation. Danny B decides to take a history class with him and be his tutor, and throughout the second semester, helps Shane get his academics back on track. In the episode "Dormal", Shane shows some improvement in his studies, so much so that Daniel allows him to go to "Dormal". Besides being a piano prodigy, Shane has also shown his potential to be a good student with his expansive knowledge of sports trivia. He is seen rattling off stats on Brittany's boyfriend, Derrick Johnson, in the episode "Markers", and he participates on Daniel's team in the episode "Quiz Bowl", specializing in sports questions. Throughout the year, Shane helps Mike with "The Mike Sanders Show", and stars with Gopher in the imitation sketches on their webcam. Shane also develops his own spin-off of Daniel's webcam titled "Not Fun Facts with Shane". While he is often a major goof-off, Shane is actually very caring and eager to help his friends, such as when he helps Gopher serenade Abigail in "Valentines Day" and when he comforts a crying Mike in "The Frat Party". He is also the first person to openly say that Danny B's girlfriend Lacey is a little "crazy". Jim Brandon as Gopher Reed,"Movieweb.com interview", retrieved on 6-9-09 party animal, and Shane's best friend/roommate. All of his T-shirts have various pictures of himself printed on them. He is the big clown of the floor, often acting a certain way to be humorous. When being himself, however, he is very caring and helpful. Early on, his other roommate, Daniel, dislikes him because he encourages all of Shane's antics, but they later become close friends after Gopher helps him to talk to a girl and get her phone number. Early in season 2, a few weeks after seeing a screening of the first season, Gopher figures that if he's going to be an internet sensation, he may as well make a profit. Thus, he and Shane begin advertising for "SexZ BoiZ" body spray throughout the series and use the money to buy beer. In "Teamwork", Gopher develops a crush on his much more conservative floormate, Abigail. Though his efforts to woo Abigail were originally rebuffed because she is engaged, he slowly becomes friends with her, and their relationship is turning more romantic as the year winds down. Throughout the year, Gopher and Shane record short webcam videos imitating their floormates and people of interest on the show. Pancho Morris as Josh Morgan, an eccentric drama student and Mike's roommate. Josh was raised in Russia, though little else is known about his background. In the episode "Parents' Weekend", he attempts to fake his own parents' visit, hiring an actress to play his mother and paying his dad to take part in their "scenes." He is best known for his bizarre behavior, which includes pretending to commit seppuku with a marker, sneaking around the floor wearing a Mexican wrestling mask, walking around completely naked, eating Mike's deodorant, and storing his food in his air conditioning vent since he doesn't own a refrigerator. In "Come (Out) Today", Josh performs his self-discovery play, and the floor is very impressed with his theatrical talent. In the episode "A Capella", Josh began working on his very own 5-South documentary film, which very rapidly devolves into a gross overdramatization of his floormates, particularly Mike. In "Blood, Sweat, and Tears" his docu-drama titled "Return To Dormalcy" is screened by his floormates and is greeted with a poor response, as nearly everyone is either drowsy or offended. He often attempts to come up with his own pranks and games like Mike does, but they are poorly-conceived and often backfire on him. In "Floor Dinner", Josh switched places with a homeless woman named Linda to do a performance piece underneath the Lincoln Bridge. He lives there with a homeless man named Hampton. Josh returns to 5-South in "Dormal" because he realizes that he needs his friends. During Dormal, there is footage of Josh making up with Mike. Jordan Riggs as Daniel "Danny B" Benjamin, an intelligent pre-pharm student who (reluctantly) shares a room with Shane and Gopher. Their relationship is highly strained at first, but Daniel eventually forms a strong bond with both of his roommates, going to Gopher for advice about girls and assisting Shane in his studies. They return the favor by helping him officially meet his "Mystery Hot Girl". Danny B's strict upbringing from his single mother has made him an upstanding adult figure, but influence from his floormates has had him loosening up and having fun in college. In "The Frat Party", with Courtney's coaching, he had his first kiss with a girl named Lacey. The two date for a while, but her clingyness is smothering him, and he dumps her in front of the entire floor in "Floor Dinner." Danny B is a black belt in Karate and often displays his martial arts talents throughout the series (his skills come in handy during the fight in "The Frat Party"). A lover of all things academic, he regularly hosts a webcam segment on the show's website titled "Fun Facts With Daniel Benjamin" in which he describes seemingly random bits of trivia relating to anything from biology to American history. Brian Singleton as Marshall Adams I,Agutos, Christopher,"Campus Circle Spotlight, Brian Singleton", retrieved 2009-06-09 the competitive, egocentric, and abusive resident assistant of 5 South. He was secretly hooking up with a resident, Steph Schwartzman, but he decided to make it official in "A Capella". His demeaning behavior eventually led her to dump him in the episode "Abby's Party". His catch phrase, "So Rad Dude", is expressed in several episodes. It is widely known that he hates Mike; he tries in any way to embarrass him or ruin his fun. In "Marshall's New Hat", it's revealed that his overbearing and demeaning personality stems from a great deal of jealousy that he harbors for his substantially more likable identical twin, William. In the episode "Dormal", Marshall wins RA of the Year over the more-qualified Yassi from 5-North and will be Residential Director for the next school year. Jessie Gaskell as Stephanie "Steph" Schwartzman, a cheerful student who had a relationship with Marshall. She is very energetic, enjoys planning many events for the floor, and wants everyone to have fun. Steph's overzealous nature serves as one of the series' primary running gags, though it greatly annoys her antithetical roommate, Abigail. Their relationship is strained due to her inability to pay attention to Abby's wishes regarding living together, as well as stealing Abby's diary and reading it live on her webcam. Steph eventually broke up with Marshall in "Abby's Party," which was followed by her falling down a flight of stairs, breaking both of her tibias. From the episode "Blood, Sweat, and Tears" through the end of the season, she uses a wheelchair. Steph has been recommended to be a Resident Assistant for next school year, but hasn't revealed whether or not she has accepted a position. Hannah Pearl Utt as Brittany "Brit" Wilcox, best friend and roommate of Courtney. She dated the school's basketball star, Derrick Johnson, but broke up with him just before the team's March Madness debut. She once had a crush on Mike, which was obvious to everyone except him, but ended it after he and Courtney hooked up while drunk. However, when "the guys" (all the primary male characters with the exception of Marshall) call her during their spring break road trip, she spends a significant amount of time conversing with Mike and subsequently appears to have made amends with him in "Tour De 5-South" in which the two are seen participating in a laser-tag game throughout the floor. In the next episode, "Marshall's New Plan", this playful trend continues; however, Brit tells Mike that she doesn't "want anything romantic" and both agree to place each other in 'the friend zone.' At the start of the series, Brit's character seems identical to Courtney (somewhat shallow and air-headed), but she gradually moves away from this mold to become her own person.