interviews
Silvia Bottini Recaps Becoming The 'First World Problems' Meme, Her Struggles With Losing Control Over The Image And What She’s Been Up To A Decade Later
hile some people featured in iconic meme formats go on to make money, launch careers or even become celebrities due to their online fame, there are many more who never see a dime and face the constant invasiveness of having their face plastered all around the web. Silvia Bottini, known online as the woman from the “First World Problems” meme, is one such example of the latter who’s had quite a love-hate relationship with her format (or maybe just hate).
In 2011, a stock photo of Bottini crying rapidly spread online and became one of the most well-known Advice Animals of the 2010s. Unamused and unable to control the use of her likeness, she struggled for years before coming to terms with the rare phenomenon and has only just recently warmed up to it. For her first-ever video interview discussing the meme, Bottini joined us to recap her experience becoming the First World Problems meme, how she’s dealt with it all and what she’s been up to a decade since her meme’s heyday.
Q: Welcome, Silvia. Thanks for joining us. So we’re coming up on your meme’s 10-year anniversary. Would you mind catching us up to speed on what you’ve been up to, as well as introducing yourself a bit?
A: Wow! It’s already been 10 years … I must have been a baby when all of it started! Once upon a time, a very young girl was an actress, and sometimes she happened to model for her devious boyfriend who never paid her for any shooting … am I playing the victim? Well, that’s what the internet loves me for! They go crazy when I cry! In the last six years, I actually cried a lot. I left behind my comfort zone, theatre, and I moved to LA to pursue my dream of winning an Oscar. After a whole bunch of comedies, suddenly I landed on the dark side of acting: the drama! I got a lead role in a short movie, 2200 Volts, that got selected at the Singapore International Film Festival and mentioned in Variety. Did I cry? Hell yes! Indeed I was on death row, unjustly accused of my girlfriend’s death.
Then I got a lead role for a short (not sure if it’s gonna be so short since it’s not been finished yet in over four years) called The Uncanny Valley, where I was a happy mom who gets into a car crash, loses her memory and becomes homeless. Did I cry? I had weird reactions, as I was way beyond sadness … totally f***ed up. I also got a lead role in a short where I was an abused wife, called My Personal Ghost Story. I had a part in a documentary, funded by Sundance, where I was asked to talk about my #meetoo experiences, called Body Parts. And yes, I cried. Then I dubbed a few super sad and bad people in the Spanish TV show Farina/Cocaine Coast produced by Netflix.
I did all I could to keep my spirits up! So I wrote, produced and played eight shows for kids and teenagers for Fondazione Italia, an organization funded by the Italian Consulate. I played four characters in a comedy, The Original English, that won the Encore Producers Award at the Hollywood Fringe Festival. Last but not least, I tried the “exorcism”: to make my crying meme laughable in the short movie First World Problems.
Q: Before we jump to 2011 when the meme went viral online, can you tell us a little about your background and how you got into acting?
A: I am an only child. My parents have been working 18 hours a day since I was 3. I would say it’s pretty natural given the circumstances that I wanted to be an actor! I’ve always been extremely sensitive, creative and I wanted to share my own world with the actual one, with other humans around. So I jumped into my first acting class at the age of 13, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.
Q: So in 2008, your ex-boyfriend, who’s a stock photographer, snapped the famous image of you crying at a temple in Shanghai. Can you give us the full backstory from that day and how the image came together?
A: My devious boyfriend thought he wanted to move to China, so he asked, pardon me, forced me to go to China. I was his translator, personal assistant, model … he got a good deal: It was all for free and I had to pay for my expenses too. So we arrived in Shanghai and had a few interviews for him. I met the Chinese distributor of Bialetti, the famous coffee machine, because at that time I was the testimonial of a different brand of coffee machine that shared the same engineer as Bialetti. He told me that I would have been a great success in China, that I should move there to model or to host a TV show, that he could have introduced me, etc.
So it turned out that it would have been a better deal for me than for the talented, young, devious photographer. We pretended to visit a bit of China while I was “working” as a model. So in this temple (I don’t remember the name), I was asked to meditate, be a tourist and eventually cry.
Q: Back then, did you think anything was special about that photo or did you not really see it as particularly notable?
A: When I first saw the picture I thought it was very ugly because I looked ugly! My ex used to fix my big nose with Photoshop all the time and I hated it! I couldn’t admit that there was something wrong with my nose. Plus, I had some hope that since I wasn’t getting paid, at least I could use these pics for my portfolio. But an actor should be recognizable and not too retouched. He never gave a s**t about my needs and expectations, so here we go with my deformed face that became super famous! [laughs]
Q: The photo then sat for a few years on a stock photography website until someone pulled it from there and began using it in memes around early 2011. Eventually, it became known as the “First World Problems” format where people captioned it with reactions to trivial problems in first-world countries. Do you remember when you first saw one of these online and where?
A: I am a tech dummy, improving, but still — I’m one of those people that make any device break with only their presence, so I would have never known about the meme if it wasn’t for the compassionate gesture of an insider. It happened to be the webmaster of my first website. He sent me the pic of the first meme ever (that’s what I like to think). My initial reaction was, “What is it?!” He patiently explained to me and gave me some precious advice that I couldn’t follow. Something like, “You should start a YouTube channel!” “I already did!” Meaning, “Of course I have a profile on YouTube!”
Q: We read from older interviews back in the day that you were really upset about the image being used in memes, especially the offensive ones. Can you elaborate more on why you had a negative reaction to it at the time?
A: As I said, I wasn’t really able to be in charge of the situation, partly because of my dumminess with the internet and partly because the internet was the wild west. At that point [in 2011], there was no regulation, so anybody could write anything on my face, anywhere in the world, anytime, without having to ask for permission. Wouldn’t that be upsetting for anybody?! Of course, something was touching some nerves, such as the sinful, dirty messages on my born-and-raised Catholic, innocent face, or the comments about my actual personality — such as how it was no coincidence that I was the First World Problem meme because I was a lucky b***h who was complaining about meaningless things also in my “real life,” as shown on my FB page [at the time] in comments.
Q: What about your ex-boyfriend? Did he have a similar reaction since people were using his work all over the internet in such a way, or ever try to stop it through copyright takedowns?
A: He was already becoming a millionaire with his stock images, so he didn’t care at all, it wasn’t affecting his wallet too much.
Q: Did your family and friends know about it? How did they feel about your image becoming a meme?
A: Whoever had a computer started to see my meme. When they recognized me, they forwarded them to me, asking if I was aware of it. Of course, I wasn’t. Sometimes they were proud of being friends with some sort of celebrity, and sometimes they supported my campaign [of combating the photo's use online].
Q: Memes were still a fairly new concept back then, so how familiar were you with meme and internet culture at the time? Was your own meme your first experience with this?
A: I had no knowledge of any meme before mine.
Q: Now that it’s been nearly a decade, you seem to have a much more accepting stance and even an appreciation for the meme. What made you have this change of heart later on after you disliked it early on?
A: Survival I guess. Since being upset didn’t bring anything good, I tried to change my disposition and be creative. Not so sure that the anger is totally over, though [laughs].
Q: In recent years, you also created a web series and short film titled First World Problems based on the character portrayed in the meme. Can you tell us more about this project and how it came about?
A: I wanted to get my power back over the theft of my face. I never had the time, money or energy to start a lawsuit, so I could have either kept being upset or do something to use this unwanted popularity to my advantage. With a couple of friends, we started thinking about a project to show my point of view. So we made First World Problems, a short movie in which I’m playing the role of myself, an actress who gets auditions and jobs only if she’s gonna cry to resemble the meme.
I actually would like to create a web series that could involve the audience of the internet and other memes. The title should be “MEME ME if you dare…!” I truly believe there’s big potential in it, but I’m still looking for the budget and a producer, so dear reader, don’t be shy: If you believe you’re the right person, make a move!
Q: Aside from that project, were you able to capitalize on your meme in any other ways, such as advertisements, products and other deals?
A: What if I say that I’m totally incapable of making money? I really have many talents, but not the green one [laughs]. Indeed, it seems like everybody is earning money from this meme but me. A friend recently gave me a board game with my face on it. I haven’t decided yet if I’m gonna burn it or play with it.
Domino’s Spain decided to use my meme for a commercial and actually involved me! The conditions weren’t ideal, but still. I had to go get it and pay for the pizza that was used in the commercial … but it’s still something, right?! Then there’s another phenomenon, a pretty moving one: People who contact me through the social, asking me if they can use my meme. Honey, it doesn’t work that way! You should have a bunch of releases and you should pay for it, but what can I say? At least they were considerate and asked. Do I need a publicist? No way! Nobody’s wishing to pay for something that they can have for free!
The only approaches that I had were from private people who must have thought that I was crying for a reason and decided to be polite and ask if they could use my image for free. I really appreciate the effort. Who’s making money from it never offered to go legal. Funny thing is that the “devious” admitted that he never had a model release of mine in the first place, so not even the legal platforms are legal. So if I ever decided to sue them, I could go stellar.
Q: So what other projects and things do you currently have going on? Anything we should know about or look out for in the near future?
A: I’ve been asked to be in a documentary about memes. The title is MEME indeed. I’d really love to make it happen and be able to produce the web series about the meme (my dream is to go to The Ellen DeGeneres Show to tell my story). For my other career, the one that feeds me, I’m auditioning, anonymously, as usual, and you never can tell when the Oscar is gonna come!
Q: So do people ever recognize you from the meme out in public nowadays, or if you bring it up to someone, how do they react?
A: Nobody ever recognizes me. Today, I called my mom and told her I had a lot of writing to do because I had to finish an interview for the meme. “What?!” “Il MIM … Il Meme … la foto in cui piango!” (translation: “The picture where I cry”). “Ah!” She didn’t recognize me either. It’s because of the nose that nobody ever recognizes me. Then when I explain it, they go like, ”Oh! I’ve never seen that meme before!” So I wonder how the numbers add up … it’s probably some conspiracy, and I’m not even famous.
Q: Many people we’ve interviewed who were prominent meme characters during that timeframe got to know each other through events or shared experiences. Did you ever attend any conventions or events for being in the meme like that?
A: Whaaaaat?! Are you telling me that I’ve never been invited?! I made it to the Golden Globes and not to some convention for memes?!
Q: How often do you still see your photo being used in memes nearly a decade later? Do you think your meme is particularly funny, or do you have any favorite types?
A: I like the memes made with other people's faces, it’s just mine … too much drama in and around it.
Q: Have you ever used the First World Problems format to make a meme of it yourself?
A: Not personally. I was aware of a couple though. One was created for the crowdfunding of the film “First World Problems,” and one by my boyfriend.
Q: Seeing how you’re a meme yourself and forever immortalized on the internet, do you keep up with memes or internet humor today? Any personal favorites that come to mind?
A: Not really. I’m still an outsider. I don’t deserve to be in the “Olympus of Meme Celebrities.”
Q: So last one here is something I think you have a unique perspective on given your personal history with the experience. To anyone else who inadvertently becomes a meme in the future, what sort of advice would you give them to deal with this unique phenomenon?
A: Sue them all before any controversies arise! Be cold, be bold, be brave and fight for all of your ancestors whose identity has been stolen and used for stupid things!
Watch our interview with Silvia Bottini below for the video version of our discussion.
Silvia Bottini is an Italian-American actor whose image became the First World Problems meme, which was popularized in 2011. To see more of Bottini and her work, you can follow her on Instagram and Facebook or check out her website and IMDb page.
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