The princess and the producer, a YouTube fairytale

The world of YouTube, where an unknown talent can reach millions with a homemade video clip that goes viral, can be a wondrous realm.

But what of the anonymous talents who never rack up views?

That was the story of Samantha “Princess Shaw” Montgomery, a hardworking nurse from New Orleans, Louisiana, who had suffered abuse but never lost her ability to dream as she posted videos about her life and her music on the free video-sharing channel.

By chance, she was discovered by Ophir Kutiel, an Israeli musician known as Kutiman, who found her during one of his endless trawls through YouTube, which he uses to sample and mix transformative mashups of YouTube musicians.

That wasn’t the end of the story. For it was Ido Haar, an Israeli filmmaker who knew Kutiman, who brought the unlikely pairing of Montgomery and Kutiman to life in his latest documentary, “Thru You Princess.”

The film, which is being screened in the US and recently opened in Israeli theaters, is a tale of unlikely partners and perseverance, including Haar’s own steadfastness in seeing the story through to its end.

It began with Haar’s admiration for Kutiman’s previous works.

Kutiel is known locally for the Kutiman Orchestra, a funk band that performs mainly in Tel Aviv and often hosts local singers Ester Rada and Karolina.

He’s become even better known for his online music video project, called “ThruYOU,” which features a mix of samples of YouTube videos, combining various musicians and sometimes singers to create a wholly new kind of music compilation. Kutiman’s first “ThruYOU” video in 2009 received more than 10 million views in around two weeks. He has since produced several more “ThruYOU” pieces, as well as a series of “Thru The City” videos, in which he is commissioned to create his unique compilations for various cities worldwide.

Kutiman’s work “grabbed me by the throat; I had never seen anything like it, it’s so new, really, revolutionary,” said Haar.

When Haar heard about Kutiman’s discovery of Montgomery on YouTube, and his plan to incorporate her raw, a cappella singing in his next installment of “ThruYOU Too,” he sensed there was a bigger story to be filmed and wanted to investigate further.

“I went home and tried to understand who she is and what she does,” he said. “She talks about Mardi Gras and where she works, and her issues and her songs, so I figured out some things about her. And if you know a little rap, you get that she knows what she’s talking about. Her honesty and straightforwardness and her ability to bare her soul.”

Kutiman continued working on his next video compilation while Haar, on a trip to the US to visit a friend, made a detour to New Orleans, having made contact with Montgomery through Facebook.

The two met at a nondescript New Orleans hotel, said Haar, and Montgomery came with a friend, unsure about who Haar really was and what he wanted from her.

“She had no idea where Israel was,” he said.

By the end of that first meeting, Montgomery felt comfortable enough to invite Haar to an open-mic night where she was performing, and he came and filmed her for the first time.

“It was clear that she would be one of the main people in the film,” he said. “She just entered my heart.”

It wasn’t hard to track Montgomery’s movements, said Haar. She posts everything on Instagram, including her audition for reality show “The Voice,” and Haar merely followed her around.

“I said, ‘Great, I’ll be there,'” said Haar, who has made five films as well as directed television series. “I don’t do interviews, I really just try to catch moments, like a fisherman with a lot of patience, with my camera.”

Montgomery knew that Haar was making a movie about YouTubers, as they’re called, but she didn’t now about Kutiman or his use of her YouTube videos to produce his next installment of “ThruYOU Too.” For Haar, it was essential that he include that moment of Montgomery’s realization in the film.

“I was terrified that she would realize it at some point,” he said. “It’s not that I was there all the time, it was a few trips, but it had been about eight or nine months of filming her and I was sure it would come out.”

When Kutiman finally uploaded his video, “Give It Up,” on YouTube with links to Montgomery, Haar was there when she first realized her role in Kutiman’s video.

“We were together in Atlanta when she found out,” he said. “There was something about the moment and how the story turns that even I couldn’t have planned or realized. It became something that just moved forward and I had to run after it and catch it.”

And then Montgomery came to Israel to meet Kutiman, an event that’s also captured in the documentary.

“That was something that, again, I didn’t anticipate it would happen,” said Haar. “There was such emotion and excitement beyond what I could have imagined. It was some kind of expression of the power of cooperation that two people in two parts of the world create something together and then there’s a physical meeting and what joins them is the creation. It went up another level.”

For Haar, the fairytale aspect of the story helped created a momentum in the film that exceeded his previous works.

“My work always builds but Kutiman and Samantha gave me the signals and made me connect the dots with my camera and catch the moments,” he said.

It’s a story, he said, that couldn’t have happened twenty years ago, in the days before YouTube and Facebook and the connections made on social media.

“It’s the spirit of the times,” he said. “We all come from such different places and connect through this creation and it’s something that’s so unique. For me what was so powerful that the movie shows the talents of people that are so big that are found in so many places in the world and Internet — and there’s the chance that you’d never hear them.”

As for “Princess Shaw” Montgomery, her cooperation with Kutiman continues, as she is coming to Israel again to record with him. The two recently released a new song, “Stay Here.” And fame? It’s a lot closer than it once was.

On March 31, Montgomery and Kutiman will perform at the Jerusalem Cinematheque, after a screening of “Thru You Princess,” as part of the arthouse theater’s commemoration of Lia Van Leer, the founder of the Cinematheque, a year after her death. To purchase the NIS 38 tickets, head to the Cinematheque website.

Kutiman will perform at Tel Aviv’s Barby Club on April 6, 8:30 pm.