Actor and indie filmmaker Mark Duplass has publicly defended 20-year-old Kane Parsons, the YouTuber-turned-director of A24's new horror feature Backrooms, after online speculation suggested Parsons did not actually helm the movie.
Writing on social media this week, Duplass said Parsons was "100 percent in control" on set and "more so than many directors three times his age,"according to Variety. In a follow-up Instagram video, Duplass added that Parsons was "intensely prepared" and "didn't need" help from him or the film's producers,The Hollywood Reporter reported. The defense came after social posts circulated questioning whether a creator that young could have been the genuine creative voice behind a studio-scale film.
From YouTube series to A24 feature
Parsons first drew attention with a YouTube series he began uploading as a teenager in 2022, expanding the viral "Backrooms" creepypasta into an unsettling tour of liminal yellow corridors. Those short films racked up tens of millions of views and built an organic horror fandom long before any studio came calling. The feature adaptation now makes him A24's youngest feature director on record,per Biography.
The film stars Chiwetel Ejiofor, Renate Reinsve, Finn Bennett, Lukita Maxwell and Duplass himself, following a therapist who chases a missing patient into a dimension of endless rooms, Variety notes. Producers on the project include Shawn Levy's 21 Laps Entertainment and James Wan's Atomic Monster, who shepherded the YouTube concept into the version now in theaters.
A test case for online creators crossing over
Duplass's defense lands at a moment when studios are increasingly courting filmmakers built on YouTube and TikTok rather than the festival circuit.Kotaku framed the pushback as part of a broader skepticism that often greets very young directors handed mid-budget studio projects, especially when their resume began on a livestream rather than a soundstage.The Playlist noted that veteran crew testimonials, not just star endorsements, may ultimately settle how the industry treats Parsons's next deal.
Whether Backrooms works on its own merits is now the only question that matters; the credit, at least according to its co-star, is not in dispute.
