Where Are They Now? How Playwright And Novelist Justin Kuritzkes Went From Being The 'Potion Seller' Meme To Writing 'Challengers'

Justin Kuritzkes has walked numerous red carpets this year for his work on Luca Guadagnino's smash hit Challengers, but a decade ago, he was best known for being a mere "Potion Seller" to many around the internet.

The 34-year-old screenwriter, novelist and playwright first went viral for his irreverent Photo Booth videos back when he was still in college, studying the literary arts at Brown.

After his video Potion Seller went viral in 2014 and became a well-known meme, Kuritzkes kept posting brief and very goofy Photo Booth sketches on YouTube well into the early 2020s. In 2022, however, he stopped.

Little did his nearly 200,000-strong follower count know, Kuritzkes had been working on a script about a trio of tennis-obsessed lovers that would become something of a smash hit in 2024.

Here's what Justin Kuritzkes, AKA the Potion Seller, has been up to in the decade since he first became a YouTube legend.

Who Is Justin Kuritzkes and How Did He Get His Start On YouTube?

Before the Challengers screenwriter landed his big break in Hollywood, he was making YouTube playacting as various goofy characters using Photo Booth's image morphing filters on his Apple computer. He first began posting videos in September 2011, starting with a sketch about a widower coping with the hardships of life after facing the loss of his wife, titled "Dolores."

Kuritzkes's breakout hit on YouTube was then posted just three weeks after he made his YouTube channel. The video, titled "Potion Seller," shows Kuritzkes leaning into and out of a Photo Booth effect that pinches and widens his face to represent two fantasy characters arguing over potions. A knight going into battle nobly and calmly requests for the potion seller's "strongest potions," only to be shot down, repeatedly, by a seller who says that he just can't handle them.

Kuritzkes began to gather a reputation for using simple Photo Booth filters to create characters out of thin air. His quick improvisational style often made him suppress a giggle mid-sketch, like in his 2013 hit "In a Perfect World." He spends the nearly minute-long video repeating one phrase while tilting his face to create caricatures of his own features.

How Did Justin Kuritzkes's 'Potion Seller' Video Go Viral And What Does He Think About His Internet Fame?

Kuritzkes's "Potion Seller" video didn't really gain traction online until 2014, three years after it was first uploaded to YouTube. While Kuritzkes isn't sure how exactly his videos grew popular outside of his friend group, in a 2021 interview with Know Your Meme, he theorized that it must have been reposted to Reddit or a similar forum.

A subreddit dedicated to the video popped up in 2014, with over 9,000 Redditors logging on to joke about Potion Seller lore almost immediately. In short order, fan art and memes about the Potion Seller and knight characters began popping up on Reddit and other social media platforms, depicting a poised and noble knight beseeching the Potion Seller for his magical potions.

The internet's obsession with the Potion Seller was nowhere brief. From 2014 to 2021, the views on Justin Kuritzkes's first viral videos have nearly tripled, even as his newer videos consistently stacked hundreds of thousands of views each. In 2020, Kuritzkes returned to his channel, and possibly coped with his cabin fever by making a strange, brief short about a man performing a ritual to summon his god, "Jagos."

But Kuritzkes never really meant to go viral. A Brown graduate with several playwriting credentials under his belt, Kuritzkes was only making his goofy YouTube sketches to share with his own theater-adjacent troop of friends. In fact, Kuritzkes remembers the year his videos first went viral quite fondly.

In his interview with KYM, he mentioned that the year "Potion Seller" took off online was the year he had just moved to New York and was struggling to make inroads in the theater scene there while attempting to become a playwright.

Theater, he said, was the opposite of the internet because it is so local. "Well, even if I'm the most successful writer in the world, more people will still know me for Potion Seller," Kuritzkes said, adding that he found his viral fame humbling and even liberating because it helped put his career as a playwright into perspective.

During our interview, we also asked Kuritzkes if there were any plans for him to adapt "Potion Seller" into a movie or play. While he did tell us he didn't have any plans at the time, he admitted that he'd thought about it.

"Every once in a while I'll be like, 'Oh, should I do something with that?' And ultimately, the fun of it is that it's contained, especially for the people who are into it because it reminds them of weird encounters they have in RPGs," Kuritzkes said. "It's best for 'Potion Seller' that it stays like that, but I'm working on a lot of stuff."

Why Did Justin Kuritzkes Stop Posting To His YouTube Channel, And What Is He Up To Now?

Justin Kuritzkes had a busy decade after he first opened his YouTube channel. He graduated college, moved to New York, got married and even published his first book, Famous People. He kept posting YouTube videos well into the 2020s, still using funny Photo Booth filters and taking on a new character every time he achieved a unique way to morph his image.

But Kuritzkes hasn't posted a new YouTube video since 2022. His last upload, titled, "David's Reviews," was posted just days before he announced that Zendaya, Josh O'Connor and Mike Faist were set to star in a script that he wrote, and one that award-winning filmmaker Luca Guadagnino was set to direct.

When asked about his Potion Seller video at the Los Angeles premiere for Challengers, Kuritzkes joked, "You should not be allowed to drink potions to be a good tennis player. It’s like juicing." According to Vulture, the writer is still shocked that people remember his viral YouTube days, despite the fact that his video has "6 million more views than the 2023 U.S. Open Women's final."

It appears that Kuritzkes is well on his way to becoming an accomplished screenwriter, even appearing on Variety's list of top 10 screenwriters to watch in 2023. His wife, Celine Song, was also nominated for several awards in 2024 with her own directorial debut, Past Lives.

Meanwhile, Kuritzkes is kicking off from his Challengers victory to work on a host of new projects, including an adaption of Don Winslow's best-selling cartel trilogy City on Fire, starring Austin Butler.

Where Can I Find Justin Kuritzkes Online Today?

While it seems like Justin Kuritzkes may have put an indefinite pause on his YouTube channel and goofy Photo Booth content, it's not unlikely that he might pick up his Macbook camera and record a video in the future.

He also regularly posts about his life and work on his Instagram page, @justinkuritzkes, although his posting has grown sparse in 2024. Kuritzkes is also active on his X / Twitter account, with some of his most recent posts covering how his latest script QUEER has been picked up for international distribution.

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For the full history of Justin Kuritzkes (AKA the "Potion Seller"), be sure to check out Know Your Meme's encyclopedia entries here and here for more information. Read Know Your Meme's interview with Kuritzkes here.