Filmmaker Whit Scott is tracking 32 years of a practical joke that began when a group of four High School students in LA decided to decorate the front lawns of unsuspecting people's homes with toilet paper. Every year, a new group replaced the former, and the activity became a tradition

In the late Nineties, Whit Scott was your average American school-going brat, sitting at the back of the class, doodling during lectures, and acting like the class clown. By night, he was an undercover toilet paper hoodlum.
"In 1979, a kid named Haynes Brooke from Los Angeles, together with three of his friends, 'toilet papered' a house. They planned it like an artistic endeavour, and knew exactly what they would do, how long it would take, and how it would look in the end. One of the kids even filmed it," says Scott.



Now, more than three decades later, Scott is making a film on that suburban toilet papering project that became no less than a High School movement. Even as Brooke and his friends passed out of school, other eager school kids replaced them, making sure that the toilet papering 'vandalism' went on without interruption.

Two weeks ago, Scott created a profile on Kickstarter.com, a website that helps artists raise money for their projects. He has already collected $15,000 (Rs 6.86 lakh), and the goal is to reach $30,000 (Rs 13.7 lakh), the sum he requires to make his film.

Scott, now 29, completed his degree in Media Studies in 2006 and has been keen to make Rolled (the name he has given to his film) to document this bizarre tradition, ever since.

While teenagers around the US would partake in similar acts of amateur vandalism, Scott and his friends went about it using management principles. Scott's role was to play the historian who captured the pranksters at work. After one of his friends graduated, another was elected to take on his responsibility.

"The 'creative' decided how we were going to hit a house. Sometimes we'd decorate people's houses for Christmas in the middle of summer, or erect a yard sale on someone's front lawn. The 'architect' planned the execution. And the 'leader' basically helped everyone out, and said 'yes' or 'no' to the decisions being made," says Scott.u00a0

"Sometimes, we TP someone's house because they were starring in a play at the school, or were homecoming king. Other times we 'TPed' the house because it had great trees that looked like they needed to be covered in toilet paper," explains Scott, who swears it was all in good fun. "'TP-ing' a house leave a mess for someone else to clean up, but it's also out there for everyone who passes by to see," he adds.

Scott tracked Brooke, who's now a middle-aged songwriter, for an interview. Scott also plans to film the current members of the group. He has collected years of footage, and needs to digitise it for his film. Who is the intended audience, we wonder. "Not every person can connect with 'TP-ing' houses, but people can connect with the feeling of being rebellious and mischievous when they were in school," says Scott.

The film already has a large fan following that has contributed to Scott's fund. "By making this film I'm reminding myself and others that it's OK to take risks," says Scott, who quit his job to make the film.
Visit: Read about Scott's efforts at http://kck.st/rolledfilm