July 24, 2006, Messenger-Inquirer
by David Blackburn

The way Leah Guy lays out ideas for her new Web site - with paper, scissors and glue - is decidedly not high-tech. They get that way after she faxes them to a Web designer, who turns them into pages for www.agirlnamedguy.com, a free lifestyle and wellness site launching today. "I don't know anything about computers," Guy, 34, said laughing in a phone interview. "I can't believe I have a Web site." Guy also started A Girl Named Guy Productions to produce the show. She has talked with companies about producing commercials and infomercials, she said.

The 1990 Apollo High School graduate living in New York City is the executive producer, a writer and hostess of weekly video episodes on the site. The site will include new and archived seven- to 10-minute mini-episodes about health and nutrition, relationships, organic living, make-overs, parenting and other issues. Guy plans to have regular episodes about the environment, the subject of the first show, such as recycling and alternative-fuel cars, she said. "The plan is to do an environmental-type show once a month just because it's such a huge issue," Guy said. Visitors have a chance to find other resources about the topics, post questions or comments and read related articles written by Guy and two contributors. That interactive aspect was something Guy felt was missing from the Internet TV show "It's All About U!" she created and hosted last summer. The health-and-beauty show averaged about 250,000 viewers a week in its three-month run, Guy said. But it "wasn't a good fit" with the show's production company, which Guy said was more Web- and music video-oriented. Guy said her years in the business had given her enough experience and contacts to realize she could do it herself.

In addition to modeling and acting in TV shows, commercials and country music videos, Guy said she has worked behind the scenes in production jobs. Guy has done interviews on TV news stations and talk shows and managed health food stores in Louisville and California. "If you know all the functions and you're learning how to do a little bit of everything, and you find the right people around you to work with you, it doesn't make sense to keep working for someone else," she said. In addition to having more control, the feedback from viewers wanting to know more about health topics made Guy decide early this year to launch her site. There are only so many medications, fillers and other things people can take to "lift your spirits and make your soul feel a little bit more alive," Guy said. "People are really hungry to take their life back in their own hands. They want to feel better," she said. Guy has six weeks worth of episodes ready to air and will resume shooting Aug. 1.

"We're going to try to stay about three weeks ahead of schedule just for our sanity and so we can all have vacations at some point," she said. Episodes require at least an hour of footage, which will be edited to the final clip, she said. Since people don't stay on the Web for long, "we really try to pack a punch into as little time as we can," Guy said. Episodes have been shot around New York City so far, but Guy has plans to go on location. "I'm planning to go to Los Angeles and maybe Seattle and shoot some things this fall or this winter," she said. Guy said she has talked with a handful of sponsors, some of which liked what they saw on her Internet show last year. "Everyone wants to see what's going to happen before they really jump on board," she said. The Web site has a broader range that should appeal to advertisers, Guy said. Guy has talked with foreign companies about doing podcasts and V-casts, or downloadable video clips on cell phones. "There are so many options now to get your material out. I really visualize this as being more of a mainstay-type of show," she said. Guy wants to expand TV production within a year. She would like to be picked up by a network and/or produce an hour-length show on a national cable channel, which has been discussed. "Right now ... it would be biting off a little bit more than I could chew, probably," she said. "When you're creating everything, it's really important to create your own thing," Guy said. "You can kind of navigate where the ship's going."

As she sits at the helm headed for uncharted waters, she admits -quickly - to being a little scared. "When you create it from beginning to end, it's like part of your heart is out there," she said. "You don't know what the response is going to be. You just have to keep putting it out there. "Surely there'll be one or two people who get it."