THE 14TH ANNUAL SHORTY AWARDS

The Shorty Awards honor the best of social media and digital. View this season's finalists!

TITANÍQUE MAKES A SPLASH ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Entered in Humor

Objective

Our goal was to use humor to create a playful and culturally relevant online space for a show parodying an old movie based on a tragedy. Our work had to outweigh the tragedy of the story with humor, advocating for the importance of playfulness and agility. The team capitalized on trends and current events that appealed to our audiences, and infused the show's staple humor.

Strategy

TITANÍQUE has become a one-of-a-kind cultural experience rooted in Céline Dion's music catalog, pop culture, and unhinged fun. The kooky krazy experience goes beyond the theater. What do audiences love about TITANÍQUE? The humor—the campy jokes, unhinged chaos, and endless pop culture references.

TITANÍQUE carried these fan-favorite qualities over to their social channels, focusing on four key content streams: the iconique show itself, the film it’s inspired by, the music icon at the heart of both, and the zeitgeist of its audiences.

The social content regularly gives fans a glimpse into the show. One video shows Cal proudly showing off the oversized Heart of the Ocean in a clip that received 4.7M impressions. The improv scenes with Céline, Jack, and Rose is one of the highlights of the show, and one of the highlights on social as well, receiving 679,346 impressions and 77,748 engagements. 

The social team often reference the show’s roots, putting their own twist on and recreating well-known moments from the hit 1997 movie Titanic. Fans and cast members consistently flood the comment section with laughter and support.

This gay fantasia and queer icon of a show leverages trends, audio, and pop culture references that match the energy of the show. The team incorporates these trends into the social media feed in an over-the-top way that consistently surprises fans, uniting their community of "Tistaniques" on and off the stage. They capitalized on the trending "Please, these gays, they're trying to murder me" audio from "The White Lotus,” speaking directly to their predominantly LGBTQ+ audience.

With Céline Dion's music steering the ship, their social pages regularly celebrate the queen herself, tapping into her unique sense of humor. They also celebrate their community, giving props to the fans that have supported the little ship that could from the very beginning. In a sea of humor, meaningful messages like these resonate with the fans, making them feel like they're truly a part of something bigger than themselves. 

The show leans into memes, trends, and current events, regularly updating references. The ever-changing nature of the show kept the social team on their toes ready to leverage any newly implemented jokes. Keeping a close eye on timely trends, the team found ways to keep the social content fresh and relevant. Our team also worked closely with the show’s creators, allowing our social channels to align the show’s humor. This partnership and understanding was crucial to developing their social presence. We didn’t just want to “be funny,” we needed to find a way to infuse that humor in a way that serviced the show.

Results

For an off-Broadway theater with less than 300 seats, Earning 21M impressions and 1M engagements across all social channels in its first year of performances at the Daryl Roth Theatre was quite an accomplishment! TITANÍQUE’s chaotic personality and campy humor shine, connecting current fans with future fans.

The social accounts regularly share fan-favorite moments from the show, including the signature improv scenes, which have received 679,346 impressions and 77,748 engagements. The social content also taps into trending audio and pop culture references that match the energy of the show and cater to their predominantly LGBTQ+ audience. In the comment section, you'll often find current and past cast members laughing along with their loyal stans, making them and the show feel even more accessible.

Their strong online presence with quotable and shareable content has resulted in individual posts receiving 4M+ impressions each, an engaged fanbase, and just as many first time ticket purchases as return trips. One social media campaign shared a “passenger punch card” for fans to re-share their story, bragging about how many times they had seen the show. With some fans having seen the show 60 times, the show has developed a huge cult following. 

Throughout 2023, TITANÍQUE has consistently had an above 50% out-of-towner ticket buying rate, which is impressive and rare for a niche off-Broadway show.

The show, which has won multiple awards (Las Culturistas Culture Award, Off-Broadway Alliance Award, Lucille Lortel Award, Dorian Theatre Award) has extended multiple times. After their original run was scheduled to end in 2022, they extended and moved to an even larger venue in November 2022 to accommodate demand. Then, they extended to September 2023, then to June 2024. And as long as TITANÍQUE keeps sailing, so does her social team.

Media

Video for TITANÍQUE MAKES A SPLASH ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Entrant Company / Organization Name

Situation, TITANÍQUE

Links

Entry Credits