By Douglas Burns

A Drake University professor stars in a nationally recognized YouTube video that has garnered major media attention for its creative, laugh-out-loud defense of the Hawkeye State.

Scott Siepker’s “Iowa Nice” short film — produced on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day in response to stereotyping of Iowa by the media — has more than 1 million views (and counting).

The two-minute video seeks to debunk certain coastal narratives about Iowa being a cultural monolith of prejudiced reactionaries. The more popular version (874,000 hits) contains some profanity, but Siepker’s team has posted a sanitized version as well (265,000 hits).

“Iowa is not what you think it is,” Siepker, a Mount Carmel native, said in an interview with Cityview. “There are so many misconceptions out there.”

Siepker, 29, and “Iowa Nice” director, his longtime theatrical collaborator, Paul D. Benedict, have seen their work go viral with features on CNN International, MSNBC and BBC World News.

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow termed “Iowa Nice” “the single-most-entertaining ad to come out of Iowa this political season.”

The Atlantic Monthly, Huffington Post, Omaha World-Herald and other media published stories on “Iowa Nice.”

In the video, Siepker, pictured near the state Capitol and in farm settings, defends agriculture and champions the state’s history of tolerance — the legalization of gay marriage and opportunities for women as attorneys, for example. It also spotlights the science involved in modern farming.

The video went live at about 10:30 p.m. on Jan. 1 and earned instant street credibility online.

“By the next day, I was getting recognized in the mall,” Siepker said.

Many people have interpreted “Iowa Nice” as a colorful counter to University of Iowa Professor Stephen Bloom’s high-profile and controversial criticism of Iowa published in Atlantic Monthly’s online version prior to the Iowa Caucuses.

“Our piece is not a direct response to his,” Siepker said. “Of course, the Stephen Bloom piece was playing into all that coverage.”

Actually, Siepker said, Benedict wrote the script after hearing a National Public Radio story that described Iowa City as a “liberal enclave.” Benedict thought that painted the rest of the state as something else, which isn’t the case as Iowa has voted for the Democratic candidate in five out of the last six presidential elections, Siepker said.

While that latter fact is mentioned in the video, “Iowa Nice” is not overtly partisan. YouTube even included an ad for GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney in one version.

Siepker said the video’s strength is its sense of humor.

“We took a page out of the Stephen Colbert-Jon Stewart book,” Siepker said. “Once you get people laughing, they’re disarmed.”

Siepker, an adjunct professor of acting at Drake University, is a leading player in the launch of a “webisode,” an online dramatic independent movie that chronicles bootlegging and its surrounding issues in 1931 rural western Iowa. “Valentine Road” co-stars Siepker, who is also the co-producer and now lives in Des Moines. The series is scheduled to be released in 10-minute segments, and producers hope the program draws the interest of a studio or independent film organization so it can be shown in its entirety.

Siepker, Benedict and Brendan Dunphy are the principals behind Iowa Filmmakers, the organization that produced “Iowa Nice.”

“We are all trying to catapult ourselves from ‘Iowa Nice’ into the next phase of our career,” Siepker said, noting that the trio is committed to doing lifelong work in Iowa even if some projects take them to New York City or Los Angeles.

Already, Siepker has built a lengthy resume on stage and screen beginning at Iowa State University and later as a master of fine arts student at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

He’s now the co-host of Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Outdoors,” a 30-minute show that’s taken him cave diving at Coldwater Cave in northeast Iowa and bicycling through cold winter days (the BRR ride between Perry and Rippey) in Iowa, among other things.

One of Siepker’s biggest audiences came during one of the more high-profile political events in Iowa history — when Oprah Winfrey came to Des Moines to campaign for now President Barack Obama.

“I was contacted to write a skit to open up the event at Hy-Vee Hall,” Siepker said. “I did write something — of course I wrote myself the most important part — and directed it. It was a comedic mock caucus between the decades of the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. What made the event over the top to be a part of was that there were 18,000 people there.”

Besides being in performances at Iowa State University, Siepker played the lead in two well-known stage stories at Des Moines Playhouse. In 2006 he played the Neil Simon character in “Biloxi Blues,” and a year later he played Benjamin, the character made famous by Dustin Hoffman, in “The Graduate” at the playhouse. CV

Douglas Burns is a fourth-generation Iowa newspaperman who writes for The Carroll Daily Times Herald and offers columns for Cityview.