YouTube is taking over Hollywood

YouTube is taking over Hollywood

From The Vergecast by The Verge

June 11, 2026 · 34 min

About this episode

The episode discusses the impact of YouTubers on Hollywood and the success of their films.

Movies directed by YouTubers are suddenly blowing up at the box office. Backrooms and Obsession are both smash hits, and The Amazing Digital Circus had a big debut last week. Is this the moment YouTube truly takes over Hollywood? Julia Alexander, media correspondent at Puck, walks us through the much longer history of YouTube on the big screen, and helps us figure out where this all goes next. Is the future just really, really big YouTube videos? Further reading: ⁠Backrooms is at the forefront of horror’s YouTube wave⁠ ⁠Iron Lung’s path to theaters was unique, even if the movie isn’t⁠ ⁠YouTube is everything and everything is YouTube⁠ Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to vergecast@theverge.com or call us at 866-VERGE11. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

People in this episode

Host: The Verge

Guest: Julia Alexander

Topics covered

  • YouTube
  • Hollywood
  • movies
  • media
  • box office
  • digital content

Keywords

  • YouTube
  • Hollywood
  • movies
  • box office
  • Julia Alexander
  • digital circus
  • Backrooms
  • Obsession

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: YouTube, Puck

Books & works: Backrooms, Obsession, The Amazing Digital Circus

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