Taryn Southern Biography

Taryn Southern (born July 16, 1986) is an American singer, actress and comedian. She was part of American Idol season three's Top 50. Southern gained national attention with her video Hot4Hill during the 2008 Presidential race. She later went on to star in and executive produce DirecTV's first original series, Project My World.

Early life

Southern grew up in Wichita, Kansas, and landed her first starring role in a pre-broadway theatrical production at the age of 10. As a teenager, she co-hosted a regional talk show for WB Kansas that addressed controversial teen issues like sex and drugs. She graduated from Wichita East High School in 2003.

At the age of 20, Southern graduated two years early from the University of Miami, earning both a B.S. in Anthropology and a B.A. in Journalism. While in school she received a grant to travel to Peru to study the shamanic use of ayahuasca among rainforest communities.

Career

In 2004, at 17, she appeared on third season of American Idol, making it to Hollywood week and the Top 50.

After graduating from college, Taryn worked briefly at NBC and Morgan Stanley in Miami before moving to Los Angeles in 2006. She sold and produced a travel show, Project MyWorld, for DirecTV, which followed her and her two friends as they traveled the world and met their MySpace friends.

On July 2, 2007, she released a comedic YouTube video called Hott4Hill in support of the presidential campaign of U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton. The video, which she wrote and performed, shows her singing and dancing in a jokingly suggestive manner about her personal admiration of Clinton and how much she would like to see Clinton win the election. That same year, Southern starred in the first WB online series, Sorority Forever, alongside best friend and lonelygirl15 star, Jessica Rose.

In November 2008, Southern and Jessica Rose, launched Webutantes, a new media studio. Also in 2008, Southern wrote/produced her first comedic musical web series, Private High Musical, which was released across various media platforms, and later sold to MTV as a half-hour comedy pilot, with David Zuckerman (Family Guy) as co-writer/executive producer.

In 2009, she starred in DJ Lubel's video, "Wrong Hole," humorously retelling the story of an inadvertent adventure in anal sex.

In 2010, she had a recurring role in the 5th season of the CBS comedy series Rules of Engagement, as well as a part in the movie Battle: Los Angeles as a reporter.

Also in 2010, she released the first video, "Keep it in Your Pants," from her upcoming comedy album, On My Face, on YouTube. The song reached #20 on the iTunes comedy chart. Southern released a variety of other music videos on her YouTube Channel, TarynSouthern.

In the fall of 2011, Taryn hosted the pre-show for the US version of The X Factor. She also provided voice over for the character Judy on the Fred animated series on YouTube.

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2006"2007	Project My World	Taryn	Nine episode documentary
2007	Hot 4 Hill	Hot4Hill	Digital short featured on Fox, CNN, MSNBC and other news outlets
2007"2008	The Heavy Show	Various characters
2008	Senior Skip Day	Isha	movie
2008	Sorority Forever	Taryn Monaghan	31 episodes
2008	Private High Musical	Sandra Smith	In addition to starring also wrote and produced
2009	Single Black Female	Jennifer	movie
2009	Woke Up Dead	Debbie
2010	The Frankenstein Brothers	Joy	movie
2010	Pound of Flesh	Dyonesia Cosa	movie
2010	Rules of Engagement	Allison	4 episodes
2010	The Temp Life	Nancy Roder	8 episodes
2010	Battle Los Angeles	Reporter on beach	movie
2011	ElfQuest: A Fan Imagining	Timmain	Digital short
2012	New Girl	Megan	Guest appearance in Season 2, Episode 3 "Fluffer"

Discography

On My Face (2012)