Jennifer Ann McAllister (born July 9, 1996),[1] also known by her former pseudonym and YouTube username jennxpenn, is an American internet personality, actress and comedian. She is best known for her work on YouTube,[2] for which she has been nominated for a Shorty Award and four Teen Choice Awards.
McAllister created her YouTube channel jennxpenn at the age of 12 on January 15, 2009, but already had prior YouTube experience through a channel created beforehand with a friend.[5] The channel has amassed over 3.5 million subscribers,[6] and earned her nominations for a Shorty Award for YouTuber of the Year, and four Teen Choice Awards.[7][8][9][10]
In March 2013, McAllister signed a YouTube partnership deal with AwesomenessTV;[4] she appeared primarily in skits and segments on their YouTube channel. She also starred in the pilot episode of AwesomenessTV's sketch comedy series of the same name,[11][12] which premiered on Nickelodeon on July 1, 2013.[13]
McAllister in 2014
Beginning in April 2014, McAllister went on a 16-city North American tour in celebration of reaching 1 million subscribers on YouTube with Tyler Ward, which took place at the beginning of May and the entirety of June.[14] In June 2014, she signed a YouTube management deal with Fullscreen.[15][16] In a September 2014 interview with Business Insider, she expressed interest in hosting and acting.[17] That same month, she partnered with the nonprofit organization Our Time, releasing a video telling her viewers aged eighteen or above to register themselves to vote in the United States.[18][19]
At the 2015 Playlist Live convention, it was announced that McAllister and fellow YouTuber Lauren Elizabeth Luthringshausen would be starring in a film titled Bad Night, which serves as her acting debut.[20] The film was produced by GRB Entertainment,[21] McAllister, and Luthringshausen, among others.[22] It was released through Vimeo on Demand in July of that same year.[23][24] In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, she described the project as an "amazing experience" and that seeing herself on screen left her "cracking up at the fact that this is a real thing because I can't take myself seriously. So we're going to be hot messes, but I think we'll make it through."[22] Also in 2015, McAllister made her writing debut with the autobiographyReally Professional Internet Person,[25][26] which was released in August 2015 and became a New York Times Best Seller.[27]
In February 2016,[28] it was announced that McAllister would portray the leading role of Andie Fixler in the YouTube Red original series Foursome.[29][30][31][32] In an interview with TheWrap, she described her relationships with the series' cast, stating that "I grew really close to everyone. It was kind of like a summer camp ... I was on set for 12 and a half hours every day, so you're really close with these people."[33][34] She created content for her channel five to six weeks before production on Foursome began in order to exclusively focus on the series.[33] The series was released in March 2016, and ran for four seasons until the end of 2018.[35][36] For her performance, she won the Streamy Award for Best Actress at the 6th Annual Streamy Awards,[37][38][39] which was presented to her by her friend and frequent collaborator, Andrea Russett. She also received a shared nomination with the cast of Foursome.[37]
In 2018, McAllister was cast in the role of Deanna Hoffman in the Hulu series All Night, which was the second collaboration between AwesomenessTV and Hulu.[40][41][42] The series stars a large ensemble of actors and premiered in May 2018.[43]
In 2019, McAllister competed in the first season of The Reality House,[44][45][46] a web series inspired by Big Brother where several YouTubers compete for $25,000.[44]
At the end of 2021, McAllister stopped posting on her YouTube channel jennxpenn, instead focusing her attention on live streaming on Twitch. She quickly rose to the top 0.04% of streamers on the platform, streaming primarily in the Just Chatting category.[47] She posts edited versions of her live streams on a second YouTube channel which has amassed over 500 thousand subscribers.[48]
Personal life
In November 2020, in a video titled "addressing your assumptions about me...",[49] McAllister publicly came out as bisexual, saying she had been identifying as bi in her personal life since she was 19 years old.[50][51]
^Jaworski, Michelle; Votta, Rae (August 31, 2014). "Meet the YouTube class of 2014". The Kernel. The Daily Dot. Archived from the original on September 7, 2015. Retrieved December 23, 2016.
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