Gym rats need to be made fun of. Nobody’s done it yet.
Everyone’s been too busy parodying bodybuilders and douchebags – who, one could argue, are all concentric circles in the same Venn Diagram – to take an extended look through a satirical lens at the superfit that walk among us, at the bridge-and-tunnel trainers that work at city clubs and sell personal sessions like used car salesmen, at the top-heavy dudes that invent awkward stretches so they can put your girl into sexually suggestive positions by the treadmills for $60/hour.
The personal trainer is an archetypal character in need of some comedic attention, and Gloria Claderon Kellet gives it fair treatment in Get Ripped.
Created by Kellet, shot by Firefly, distributed by new media studio 60Frames, and starring Rand Holdren, it’s a POV tour of your local LA Fitness with a guide hopped up on copious amounts of Ephedrine. And it costs $20,000 an episode.
From John Horn at the LA Times:
“There’s no sponsorship deal in place yet for ‘Get Ripped’…but 60Frames hopes a fitness product would eventually sponsor the series to cover its production costs, which total about $20,000 per episode.”
Kellet’s resume impresses – she’s an award-winning playwright, a writer for CBS’ How I Met Your Mother, a member of the LA-based sketch comedy group And Donkey Makes Five, and takes one helluva headshot. Her first project in online entertainment is off to a decent start.
Despite some lingering monologue (you can tell Kellet adapted the series from one of her plays), Holdren plays the role of “stereotypical personal trainer who’s overcompensating for an overweight past” well, with exclamations exaggerated just enough to be almost believable. If you can last through the entire 4:18 premiere, you’ll be intrigued enough to wonder where your weekly workouts with Derek Gillespie will take you.
But $20,000 an episode?!? Twenty-thousand dollars an episode!?! Seriously???!!! Where’s this money going? If you’re line producing the show please get in touch with me (joshua AT tilzy DOT tv). Inquiring minds (me!) want to know what you’re spending your money on.
I’m all for big budget web shows, but a big budget Get Pumped does not need. For a lot less cash and an equal opportunity at landing a sponsor, you could buy a tricked out Red, a month with a staff writer for Cracked, and give them both to this dude.
Or follow Carrot Top around for a day with a small camera crew. He’s kinda famous, mildly amusing, and into fitness!
UPDATE: Liz talked with Get Ripped director Fed Schroeder who says he has no idea where John Horn got the $20K quote from and that the budget is actually around $3,000 per episode. I still think putting the cash towards that YouTube kid or Carrot Top would’ve been a better investment.
Comments
Eh. Where’s the subtext here? Interesting concept, but I’m not sure this thing has legs.
The $20k is pretty explainable — did you see all those names in the credits? My guess is that they’re trying to make this an actually Hollywood-style production where people actually get paid, and the money goes away pretty quickly when you do that.
I do hope that in future episodes they at least move around the gym a little. I suspect they will.
If they’re announcing it costs $20k they should put it on screen in ep1. Not only does the episode drag it’s ass the whole time, it’s just jump cuts of an okay comedic actor for 4 minutes. I couldn’t get past 2 minutes. I skipped throughout to try and find the $20k edit that takes them to Mars or something, but this is garbage. (NOT TO MENTION CLICHE). So far all I’ve seen from 60frames is a lot of talk, a lot of press, and nothing good (Squeeges getting about 300k views with front page placement on youtube is embarrassing, I’m sorry). I have about 12,000 more subscribers than them and I do it on the weekends for the cost of a mini-DV tape. I could do this show with funnier friends for nothing.
Sorry, Squeegees was the ABC thing… Douchebag Beach is the 60frames stinker I was thinking about. Horrible performance with front page YT placement (before customization interface). Still, they have a 1 million+ episode because they put a bikini contest in it. At least they did something right. :)
Brian – I’m all for paying people, but only when you need to. Spending $20K a pop on a one-character, one-camera web series is excessive.
Bobby – You live in the NorthEast? Maybe you gotta be familiar with the crowd, but I think Douchebag Beach is pre-tay good. I show it to everyone I know from Jersey and they love the thing.
I’m from Boston, live in Los Angeles. Glad people dig the D. Beach back east Josh. Just seems like a joke I’ve seen a bazillion times. Go search “Hott Car Tips” — they did it first and funnier for zero dollars.
Now go watch me in “Juno Too”. :)
OMG look at the size of that crew! Two assistant directors… really? For one shot of one guy talking into the camera? If they’re really only paying $3000 an episode, an awful lot of people are wasting their time getting paid very little to do almost nothing.
We manage to shoot our show at LetsKnit2gether.com with only two people, and one of them is the host. 60Frames is going to have to get a bit leaner and meaner if they want to succeed.
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