Casey Neistat’s David Dobrik documentary shows the creator refuses to grow up

The essence of David Dobrik, the puckish subject of Casey Neistat’s documentary Under the Influence, first crystallizes on screen during a high-pressure pitch to Netflix. It’s 2020, and the then 24-year-old sits in front of a laptop, his eyes shining with anticipation as he describes his dream gig: a serotonin supercut of a late-night variety show. “Do you watch Extreme Makeover: Home Edition or any of those reaction shows?” he asks representatives from the streaming giant. “You’re really just waiting for that final moment. I kind of wish that there was a show that just skipped all that.” He gestures urgently, “I just want to get to that final moment, I want to be there constantly.“

Dobrik has made a career out of chasing those “final moments” on camera, uploading breakneck, stake-raising romps often enhanced by alcohol and sex to YouTube. His videos have earned him more than 18 million subscribers, a show on Discovery+, and enough money to be crowned one of the highest-paid YouTube creators of 2020. His success has also made stars of a recurring cast of more than 15 friends collectively called the “Vlog Squad.” Most now have their own social media followings, merchandise, and brand sponsorships as a result of their affiliation with Dobrik and appearances in his videos.

Casey Neistat and David Dobrik in a still from a May 2017 YouTube video posted to Dobrik’s second channel.
Credit: David Dobrik

Under the Influence examines Dobrik’s explosive rise to fame and inevitable reckoning in 2021 after two career-defining events: a March report from Insider alleging that Dobrik was complicit in the 2018 sexual assault of a college student who appeared in his vlogs; and the April reveal of a 2020 accident that left a member of his Vlog Squad with a cracked skull, brain damage, and double vision in one eye.

The documentary is directed by Neistat, a filmmaker who, from 2015 to 2016, honed a daily vlog style that redefined the genre on YouTube. His snappy, vibrant portraits of his global travels and New York City gambols inspired Dobrik, who found success with his own brand of semi-scripted vlogs combining Jackass-type stunts, stand-up comedy, and reality television. “Casey [was] my favorite vlogger on YouTube [until] about two years ago, and then I started and I just took over,” Dobrik joked in a video with Neistat from 2017. “That would be funny if it wasn’t the truth,” Neistat countered.

Despite Neistat and Dobrik’s friendly relationship as contemporaries — or perhaps because of it — Under the Influence is a balanced and compelling chronicle of the ways in which power warps, incentivizes, and exploits the motivations of everyone in its orbit. 

Dobrik’s content relies mainly on the willingness of the Vlog Squad to perform: as crude caricatures, amateur stunt people, and supportive hype men. Safety and consent seem to come second to getting the shot, if they’re considered at all. In the doc, Dobrik notes that a vlog he’s filming is “not funny, unless someone gets hurt.” His assistant Natalie Mariduena calls herself “Safety Sally” but is later shown pressuring Vlog Squad member Corinna Kopf to remove her shirt while filming a fake party scene in a private jet, even after Kopf expresses her discomfort with the idea. 

The Vlog Squad have made a lot of money by putting their lives on the line and sacrificing their dignity in front of Dobrik’s audience of millions. Jason Nash, the oldest Squad member at 48, was a divorcee struggling to support his two children before befriending Dobrik, who he says has made him a millionaire.

Dobrik and members of the Vlog Squad, including Nash and Wittek, at the 9th Annual Streamy Awards in 2019.
Credit: Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for dick clark productions

“Are these people sort of being coerced into doing this because of the platform it gives them and the money it gives them?” asks Kat Tenbarge, the Insider reporter who first broke the story about the alleged rape of a woman by Vlog Squad member Dominykas Zeglaitis. “It’s only when you think about how that power dynamic is actually affecting those people’s decision-making that you can begin to see it as something that’s more exploitative.”

The documentary includes graphic footage of the result of that decision-making gray area: a 2020 stunt gone wrong. Dobrik is illegally operating an excavator on a shallow lake in Utah. Vlog Squad member Jeff Wittek, who made his first appearance in Dobrik’s videos in 2018, is attached to the crane by a thin rope, swinging in a circle, when Dobrik panics and stops the machine. Wittek crashes into its metal arm and dangles upside down from the rope, his head below water, floundering as he waits to be rescued.

“People are gonna say you’re a fucking idiot for getting on that rope and allowing somebody to control your life like that,” says Wittek, whose face has been reconstructed and whose brain and eyesight are permanently damaged. “I wasn’t thinking about it like that. I was thinking, ‘Let’s do what we got to do to make this video great.'”

A screenshot from Jeff Wittek’s YouTube documentary about the accident that permanently damaged his brain and vision. Wittek is seen here mid-air, seconds before crashing into the excavator’s metal arm.
Credit: Jeff Wittek

Early in the documentary, Neistat asks Dobrik, “What do you do for a living, David?” It’s 2018, and Dobrik is floppy haired and boyish, with an impish charm. “I convince people I am having fun,” Dobrik smiles playfully. “It’s all part of my act.” As Under the Influence digs deeper, that act begins to feel like a ploy to avoid accountability for the high-intensity, fast-and-loose environment he nurtured on and off camera. 

He seems to brush Wittek’s accident off as a result of Wittek’s own recklessness. “Jeff, for some reason, thought that I wasn’t getting the shot,” he tells Neistat. “So Jeff was like, ‘Let’s do something more exciting,’ and I am always down for more exciting, if someone brings up an idea of doing something cooler, I’m always down for that.”

When Neistat asks if the Insider article was “fair” Dobrik replies, “No. This article was written because this place wanted clicks,” he says while sitting in a $13 million house financed by near-death stunts, a podcast named Views, and a line of “clickbait” merch. He seems to see the woman’s account of rape as a pesky rumor, more harmful to him than to her. “I don’t want to respond to it because I don’t want to feed the fire of just gossip and hate and drama. I’ve always wanted to be a person that when you see me, you’re just like, laughing or smiling or you’re pumped to have me around… now I’m stained forever with something that I don’t necessarily think I should be stained with.”

Dobrik wields a Boring Company flamethrower in a vlog titled “THIS STARTED A FIRE IN HIS HOUSE!! (SURPRISE)”
Credit: David Dobrik

Have these events been a stain on Dobrik’s image? It’s hard to say. In June 2021, he made his return to YouTube, Vlog Squad in tow, with videos that usually rack up more than 9 million views each. Sponsors like SeatGeek have returned to finance him. And he’s promoting his Discovery+ series Discovering David Dobrik. Though Dobrik continues to spar publicly with Wittek and recently opened up about the rocky state of his mental health, the 25-year-old remains more successful than almost anyone his age. Most importantly, he still has millions of young people following his every move.

As it weaves a complex tapestry of power, abuse, and coercion, Under the Influence also communicates the scope and seriousness of Dobrik’s global influence beyond YouTube. Among other ventures, Dobrik has developed a perfume and a photo-sharing app, and has a pizza chain in the works. He transcends the platform that made him famous, and so does his impact on the people who watch his videos. Netflix ends up passing on Dobrik’s show because “they don’t see how a YouTuber can transition into that world.” Neistat knows that Dobrik already has.