I WANT TO BE NEENJA - MY INTERVIEW WITH JENNIFER MURPHY

Jennifer Murphy is an American businesswoman, actress, singer, writer, and former beauty pageant contestant who has produced, written, directed, and starred in her own film based on her viral music video. Her film is called, 'I Want to Be NEENJA', and recently, Jennifer was kind enough to answer a few questions about her film and its development. Here 👇, check this out.





1) Name three words that best describe who you are.   I'd say, charismatic, sincere, and unstoppable.

2) What inspired you to create, 'I Want to Be NEENJA'?   In 2008, I launched my business, GoGirl Worldwide, and began making funny, inspirational, and empowering videos for my YouTube channel in order to make people happy and attract new clients to my brand. One of these clients owns a marketing firm and asked me to create a series of videos to promote the launch of their new company, specifically requesting that I incorporate a villain who will go up against my online alter ego, GoGirl. So, after some much-needed deliberation, I created a villain who's a ninja (as I've always loved ninjas) and started writing a script for the series. But for financial reasons, my client then dropped out of the project, and to cut a long story short, I chose to produce the series myself, along with a corresponding song and music video.

Roughly around the same time, I was also launching JenniferMurphyBeds with a couple of partners who own a chain of wall bed stores. So, as I wanted to try out my new song, 'I Want to Be NEENJA', on a live audience, I chose to perform it at the launch of my first JenniferMurphyBeds store. But little did I know that during the aftermath of my performance, my song would go viral online. At first, I received a lot of negative feedback, but eventually, these helpful haters made me and my song famous because the video accumulated over one billion views on TikTok and millions of views on YouTube. That's when I decided to turn my famous song into a feature film and a comic book. After all, the story my song conveys is like a short film, as it has a beginning, a middle, and an end, so it wasn't a big stretch to turn it into a script.

3) In your own words, how would you describe this story?   The story revolves around a superhero called GoGirl who's on a mission to spread smiles throughout the world. However, her mission is hindered by a villain named Chow, who by all accounts, is a ninja billionaire with his own merch line. To me, Chow is very much like the Grinch as he can't stand to see other people happy, whereas GoGirl is the exact opposite and decides to fight back by training to become a ninja, or as she likes to call it, 'NEENJA'.

4) What song would you say best represents 'I Want to Be NEENJA' and why?   To answer this question, I'd like to select the classic 80s song by Survivor, 'Eye of the Tiger', because it's about fighting for what you want and never giving up. It's also very uplifting and catchy, which is how many people would describe my song too.

5) If you could get a celebrity - either living or dead - to promote your wares, who would you choose, and why would you want to choose this particular person?   I'd choose the late, great, Bruce Lee. Not only because he was an influential martial artist and actor who starred in several memorable films and TV shows, such as 'Enter the Dragon' and 'The Green Hornet', but because Bruce was also astute enough to use his sudden box office success to form his own production company, named Concord, and then co-produced, directed, wrote, and starred in his own film, 'Return of the Dragon' (also known as 'The Way of the Dragon'). In many ways, this reminds me of my own determination when the haters tried to cancel me, as ultimately, I became a writer, producer, director, and lead actress for my own film.

6) What's the one thing about 'I Want to Be NEENJA' that might surprise people?   The Asian girl who was in the audience on the night of my performance (the one that went viral) plays a role in my film. Many people may assume she hates me and didn't like listening to my song (which is partly why it went viral). So, it might be a fun twist for people to see what happens between the two of us in my film. It's pretty epic.

And on that note, I'd like to thank Jennifer for telling us about her film, 'I Want to Be NEENJA'. For further information, please feel free to check out her official Website, Instagram, and Facebook pages.